


A Very Narrow Bridge

by Pargoletta



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Antisemitism, Gen, Hydra (Marvel), Jewish Steve Rogers, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Pre-Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie), Psychological Trauma, The Tesseract (Marvel), Threats of Rape/Non-Con, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-16
Updated: 2016-12-14
Packaged: 2018-08-31 10:36:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 37,081
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8575027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pargoletta/pseuds/Pargoletta
Summary: After the fall of SHIELD, Loki arrives on Earth, bringing two dangerous artifacts with him.  But his presence stirs up even more dangerous home-grown hatred.  The Avengers find themselves divided between apprehending Loki and fighting off human predators, while Steve must survive an ordeal at the hands of enemies who seek to destroy both his body and his soul.





	1. High Winds

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to this story! Much as I hate to do this, here’s a brief word about its timing. I started writing it before the election that brought Donald Trump and his band of merry bigots to power. Some of the subject matter in the story seemed plausible if extreme at the time. Now, it seems even more plausible and maybe not so extreme any more, and I grieve for that. This is also the time to observe that there are villains in this story, and they do not hesitate to throw around the racial slurs. Fair warning.
> 
> In other news, this is set shortly after _The Winter Soldier_ , around the time that the Avengers seem to have been re-assembling, some time prior to _Age of Ultron_. Enjoy this, and I’ll meet you at the end.

_“The whole world is a very narrow bridge, but the essence is not to be afraid.” -- Rabbi Nachman of Breslov (1772 – 1810)_

  1. **High Winds**



   

“So the Governor of Illinois was indicted,” Clint said, barely glancing up from the nest he had made for himself on the common floor’s sofa with his laptop, a cup of coffee, and a plate of Oreos. 

“Uh-huh,” Tony replied. He went to the fridge, opened it, and surveyed its offerings. “Are you sure you’re looking at a news site? Because that’s not news. It’s not even olds.” 

Clint shrugged. “Thought you might like to know anyway. Trying to do a public service. Keeping Cap up to date.” He waved his coffee cup in the general direction of where Steve had just sat down at the bar with a Coke and a plate of assorted leftovers, including a few slices of roast chicken, a bright yellow curry mixed with rice, and a scoop of tofu pad thai. 

Steve smiled. “Not like it’s all that new to me, either.” He left his plate at the bar and came to look over Clint’s shoulder at the article on the screen. He skimmed it, then laughed and shook his head. “I’ve seen worse.” 

“Yeah?” Tony selected an energy drink, and grabbed a bag of microwave popcorn from a cupboard. 

“Len Small,” Steve said, returning to the bar. “Read about him in the papers my friend Arnie Roth used to sell. I think he was acquitted, but what I really remember is that the Klan endorsed him for a long time.” 

Clint snorted. “Well, ain’t that just what you want out of your career? I mean, I always look for the Klan’s endorsement so I know who not to vote for, but –“ 

The elevator doors opened with a polite _ding_ , and Natasha stepped out, wearing loose cotton trousers and a t-shirt, her hair damp from a recent shower. “Are we eating together tonight?” she asked. 

Clint, Steve, and Tony exchanged glances. Steve shrugged. “I guess,” he said. “I was feeling . . . I came down here to see if there was company. Clint was here.” 

“It’s my building,” Tony said. “I can be wherever I like.” 

“How’d the training go?” Clint asked. “I mean, I notice you’re still in one piece, but I don’t see Banner.”

Natasha grabbed a protein shake from the fridge. “Upstairs. The session took a lot out of him, and he said he wanted to stay in his own place tonight. He’s got food, he’ll be fine.” 

“Any results on the research front?” Steve asked. 

Natasha took a long swallow of the protein shake and rolled her head and her shoulders before she answered. “Three successful attempts at the code phrase today.” 

Tony let out a low whistle. “Impressive. I’ve only ever gotten him to calm down once. Cap?” 

Steve shook his head. “Once for real, and then there was that time when I got up too fast and he went green again. You’re the best at it, Natasha. I wonder if it’s something in the pitch of your voice.” 

“Nah,” Tony said. “He likes her, is all. Natasha Fatale.” 

Natasha glared at him. “You’re lucky I’m pooped, Stark. Or you’d never even know what hit you.” 

Clint cackled. “Yeah, you’d never figure out if it was her, or if it was Banner after he heard that you just made him into Boris Badenov.” 

Making a mental note to look up the names “Natasha Fatale” and “Boris Badenov” in the privacy of his own rooms, Steve tuned out their bantering, and turned his attention to his food instead. The pad Thai really was delicious, and he was beginning to see the appeal of tofu. He speared a clump of rice noodles with his fork as he tried to remember who had first recommended that he try Thai food. After a moment, an image popped into his mind. 

It had been at the SHIELD holiday party the previous year. Steve had just been transferred to Washington and hadn’t yet had a chance to meet the SHIELD team in that city. He had moved away from the large, glowing Christmas tree, and had been pleased to discover a tiny electric menorah tucked away on a side table. One of the technicians was standing by it, drinking a cup of punch and looking just as awkward as Steve felt. The technician had been happy to show Steve how the LED bulbs in the fake blue candle flames worked, and introduced himself as Agent Cameron Klein. Before long, they began to share stories of Hanukkahs past. Agent Klein had piqued Steve’s interest by telling him about how his family went out for Thai food at Christmas one year after their local Chinese restaurant closed, and had loved it, and had made that Thai restaurant their new family tradition. Steve had put “Thai food” on his list of things to experience right away, although between a series of grueling missions with the STRIKE team, the disaster with HYDRA in the spring, and his subsequent move back to New York, he hadn’t gotten around to trying it until now. He lifted his Coke in a small private toast to Agent Klein, hoping that the man had managed to recover from the wreckage of SHIELD. 

As if in response to his mood, the room darkened. Steve looked up from his meal and saw Tony and Natasha gazing out of the floor-to-ceiling glass windows that decorated the communal residential floors of Avengers Tower. From this high up, they afforded a stunning view of thunderclouds rolling in, boiling through the atmosphere much faster than any naturally occurring weather phenomenon. 

“Looks like we’re expecting one more for dinner,” Natasha said. 

Tony nodded, and went to the panel on the wall that controlled an intercom connected to the residential apartments and the rooftop garden. “Use the landing pad, Hammer Time,” he called. “I just had the floors re-done, and I’m really liking the –“ 

With a crack of thunder and a flash of lightning, Thor touched down on the deck outside. The clouds swirled above his head for a moment, but dissipated as quickly as they had gathered. Thor waved them away and headed for the door. 

“Hammer Time?” Natasha asked. 

Clint laughed. “Think we just discovered Iron Man’s _secret_ secret identity, Nineties Guy.” 

“Hey,” Tony said, unable to keep the amusement from his voice. “1990 was a good year for me.” He pressed the lock switch, allowing Thor to enter from the deck. “Come on in. We’re just having dinner. It’s fend-for-yourself-night, but there’s plenty of stuff in the fridge.”

Thor flashed a quick, distracted smile. “My thanks. But I did not come here to dine.” 

“Uh-oh.” Clint curled protectively around his Oreos. “I did. And I kind of feel like that intention is being threatened right now.” 

“Clint,” Steve said, using his best imitation of his mother’s warning tone. “What’s going on, Thor?” 

Thor glanced around the room, not quite managing to meet anyone’s eyes. He fidgeted with Mjölnir’s strap for a moment before he spoke. “There has been . . . a disturbance in my realm,” he offered. 

Steve frowned. “Asgard? What’s happening there? Is it . . . you’re not . . . is it your father?” 

“Yes and no.” Thor sighed. “My father is . . . missing.” 

The others exchanged quick, worried glances. “Are we going to go look for him?” Tony asked. “I could program JARVIS to –“ 

“No.” Thor shook his head. “The danger is beyond that.”

“Asgard’s not going to blow up or anything, is it?” Natasha asked. “Does it need your father to survive or something?” 

“Not quite as desperately as we had assumed,” Thor said, with a wry smile that vanished almost as soon as it had appeared. “It seems he has been missing for several years.” 

Steve blinked as he tried to absorb what he had just heard. “Years?” he said. “How can it be years? I thought, the King of Asgard . . . “ 

“It was my brother. He assumed Father’s form and usurped his place on the throne, which he has long coveted.” 

That brought the others up short. The city still bore the scars wrought by Loki wielding a large, but limited, amount of power. The thought of what someone so powerful and so unstable could do with the full might of Asgard behind him was enough to make Steve’s gut freeze up and his breath hitch. He glanced at the others, who looked equally apprehensive. Clint had shoved an Oreo into his mouth whole. Natasha sat down next to him, not quite touching him, but close enough that Clint would be able to feel her presence. 

After a moment, Tony broke the spell. “I don’t get it,” he said. “What exactly do we need to do here? Are we finding your father? Are we trying to stop Loki? Fight all of Asgard? I mean, I’m guessing we’re all happy to help, but I’m not sure what we can do.” 

“What? Oh.” Thor glanced around at their worried faces, and shook himself. “I am sorry. I did not intend to – no. Loki is not leading the forces of Asgard. Asgard is without its king, but I have left the Lady Sif to rule in my place until I return. My undertaking is to find what has become of Loki, and return him to the imprisonment to which my father sentenced him as punishment for bringing the Chitauri to your world.” 

“Okay.” Tony nodded. He clenched and unclenched his jaw. “We’re the bounty hunters, going after the bad guy. We can do that. How do we do that?” 

Steve took a deep breath. “Loki’s all about disguise, so we don’t search visually. We’ll have to go by what he does.” He nodded at Thor. “I can’t imagine he’d waste time once he knows you’re after him. If we can figure out what he wants, we can look for signs of that starting to happen. Loki was right in the middle of it last time. Is there some way that we can watch out for strange things on . . . on any of the other worlds out there?” 

Thor nodded. “I suspect that he is here,” he said. “Loki has a quarrel with this world, both because I claim its protection and because it defeated him. I think he will come here. He is clever, but there are patterns to his rage.” 

“Okay,” Clint said. He got up and went to the kitchen area. “Sounds like we don’t need to suit up just yet. If we’re just going to wait for weirdness, I’m going to take advantage and get some more cookies. Psych myself up. Loki. For cri-pete.” 

The grim undertone in Clint’s voice was not lost on Steve, nor did he miss that Tony had gone pale and started to fidget with his watch strap. Truth to tell, he was glad that he had not eaten more than a few bites of his own dinner before hearing that Loki had returned. At the moment, watching and waiting seemed like an excellent plan, if only to give them all a bit of time to steel themselves before facing a formidable enemy. And, Steve thought, that probably included Thor as well. He recalled only too well how sick he had felt suiting up to take down SHIELD, knowing that Bucky would most likely be deployed against him. 

“Thor has an apartment here, right?” he asked Tony. “He can stay with us until we have to go?” 

Tony shook himself out of contemplating his watch and blinked. “What? Oh. Yeah. Three floors up. Fully stocked kitchen, laptop with a Skype connection in case you want to get in touch with Dr. Foster – I’ve been reading some of her work, by the way, very impressive.” 

“Good,” Steve said. “Looks like we’ve got some wait time ahead of us. Do what you need to do, but be ready. Get something to eat, and grab some sleep if you possibly can. We may not have time later. Thor, I can show you to your place, if you want.” 

Thor smiled and shook his head. “No need, Captain. I have not forgotten about elevators.” 

“It’s over there,” Tony said, waving vaguely in the general direction of the elevator. “I don’t like waiting. I’m going to see about programming JARVIS to keep an eye out for any Loki-like weirdness so we’ll know when we have to go. I’ll be in Lab 4 if you need me.”

“I’ll fill Bruce in,” Natasha said. “He should be back to himself by now.”

“You do that.” Steve watched as everyone left the common floor on their various errands. Only Clint remained, having brought the entire package of Oreos over to his nest. 

Steve contemplated his plate full of leftovers. He knew that he needed food, and the Army had trained him to eat when he had the chance, but he wasn’t sure that microwaved pad Thai would sit as well in his stomach as it had before Thor arrived. The kitchen still smelled like Tony’s popcorn, though, and that gave Steve an idea. He turned to Clint, who was dunking an Oreo into his coffee and starting to develop a thousand-yard stare. 

“Oreos aren’t a meal,” he said. “Want some popcorn to go with them?” 

Clint forced a smile. “That microwave shit? It always tastes burned.” 

“Yeah, but I know how to make real popcorn,” Steve said. 

“On the stove? With, like, oil and stuff?” 

“Yup.” 

Clint’s smile became real. “Bring it on,” he said. “You make the popcorn, and I’ll find us a movie.” 

“You got a deal.” Steve got a pot, oil, and the jar of plain popping corn out of the cupboard. It wasn’t quite sitting in a camp with the Howling Commandos eating C-rations and telling dirty jokes, but it was almost as comforting. 

After a few minutes, the sound of popping corn filled the kitchen area. Steve refilled his glass of Coke and put another pot of coffee on for Clint. Once the popcorn was made and salted, he carried the bowl and his Coke over to the sofa. 

“I’ve got the snacks,” he said. “What’s the show?” 

Clint smiled. “I got just the thing, Cap,” he said. “I couldn’t decide between a screwball comedy to take our minds off the shitty day we’re about to have, and something about an invasion to psych ourselves up. So we’ve got the best of both worlds. A screwball comedy about a Russian invasion!” 

“That sounds pretty good.” Steve sat down next to Clint and dug a handful of popcorn from the bowl as Clint started the movie.

  

 

Elsewhere in the tower, the rest of the team made their own preparations for the vigil and the battle that would inevitably follow. Bruce received the news of Thor’s visit from Natasha politely and with apparent good grace, but Natasha could see the strain building up behind his eyes as he considered his last engagement with Loki. 

“Well,” he said. “That sounds like it put a damper on everyone’s evening.” 

Natasha shrugged. “A bit.” She was located exactly one meter and fifty-seven centimeters from the door. Her assets included seven types of unarmed combat, a hair tie decorated with brightly-colored taser disks, and the towel that Bruce had draped over the back of a chair that was easily within arm’s reach. She smiled at Bruce. 

Bruce gave her a flickering grimace in return. “I’m glad we had a chance to practice today,” he offered. “You have a nice voice.” 

“Thank you.” 

“Real good at singing lullabies.” 

_Tili tili bom . . . Can you hear him closing in? Lurking around the corner staring at you._

She smiled at him. “Think we got something going there.” Three and a half meters away, there was a utility closet where high-voltage electrical wires connected to the tower’s arc reactor were hidden behind a removable panel. 

Bruce nodded. “Yeah. That’s good. I feel better knowing that there’s a bit of external help available.” He fiddled with one of the stones on his meditation altar and worried the sticks of incense in their box. “Guess we’ll have some exciting times coming up. Think I’ll take advantage of the wait and do some deep breathing. Thanks for telling me.” Though brief, his smile was real this time. 

“Cap thinks that’s a good idea, too,” Natasha said. “I’ll just leave you to it. We’ll let you know if something comes up.” She nodded politely and made her exit. Inside the elevator, she hit the button that would return her to the gym.

  

 

Thor spent the night stretched out on the large bed that Stark had provided for him. The calculation device that would allow him to speak to Jane sat unopened on the desk. He did not know what he might say to her; he had promised to protect her world from harm, but it seemed that he had failed in that endeavor. Worse, he had failed by succumbing to deception, a fault that was surely not worthy of either a warrior or the Heir of Asgard. 

Or the King of Asgard, for that matter. Even if they did manage to hunt Loki down and return him to his cell, the All-Father was still missing. Asgard could not remain without a rightful ruler for long. Even a short time earlier, Thor would gladly have stepped up to assume the crown, but now he found that the idea held little appeal for him. He enjoyed his visits to Midgard, and the opportunities it offered for glorious battle, merry revelry, and interesting entertainment. And if he became King, he would have to put Jane away and take a lady of Asgard as his Queen. He could only hope that, once captured, Loki would reveal what had become of Odin. 

_Where are you, brother? What corner of this world have you chosen to receive the first drop of your poison and your lies? Where have you hidden Father, our Father, the Father who raised you in the love and honor of a Prince of Asgard, and whom you repaid with betrayal?_

Loki did not appear, and most likely would not have provided answers even had he done so. 

 

 

Tony whistled tunelessly through his teeth as he recalibrated the popcorn grenades in one of his suits. If he could pack them more efficiently, he might have room in each compartment for a set of taser disks like Natasha had or a miniaturized repulsor beam. Given what it had taken to stop Loki the last time, there was no way that Tony was going into battle against him less than armed to the teeth. He had told JARVIS then that there was no time for spinning rims. But now, since he had programmed JARVIS to search for anomalies and had nothing to do but wait, he was going to go all out. Spinning rims, racing stripes, flaming exhaust stacks, even – as long as he was extending the metaphor – a pair of fuzzy dice. The new suit would have it all. Tony would be able to protect his friends and stand a chance of coming out of it alive. 

“Sir,” came the smooth voice of JARVIS. 

Tony’s hand wobbled, and a spark flew from the suit wiring and stung his finger. “Ow. Damn. What is it, JARVIS?” 

“I believe I have located a behavioral anomaly of the sort that you requested that I seek out.” 

Tony put his wounded finger in his mouth and wandered over to the interface screen. “What have you got?” 

“There was an incident involving the defacing of a synagogue in Springfield, Illinois with a swastika.”

Tony shook his head, even though he wasn’t sure if JARVIS could register a movement like that. “Hate to say it, but that’s not unusual enough behavior, even in this day and age.” 

“I think you will wish to see the video of the event, sir.”

“Yeah? Sure, whatever.” 

The interface screen lit up, and Tony had a shaky view of a Greek Revival building that looked as much like a bank as a synagogue, on an unremarkable street with a few scraggly trees. The video had obviously been taken on someone’s cell phone, and the amateur videographer’s hand had been none too steady. Tony squinted at the screen, trying to make out what was going on. In the video, a man charged up the steps of the synagogue, shouting incoherently, and the owner of the cell phone began to shout as well. Tony peered more closely at the action. 

“JARVIS, enhance that image,” he said. “Is that . . . who I think it is?” 

“Appearance is consistent with the current Governor of Illinois, sir.” 

Tony watched, fascinated despite himself. What he saw next made him recoil in instinctive horror. “Oh my God. That was . . . that was beyond not right. That left ‘not right’ behind five exits back, and is heading past Crazytown at top speed. No more work on the suit tonight.” He closed his eyes and pursed his lips, trying to decide how best to report the incident. 

“JARVIS, call Cap in here. He should probably see this first, before briefing the others.” 

“Very well, sir.” 

JARVIS sent out the call, and Tony busied himself clipping off wires in his suit and clearing the workspace. Steve entered the lab a few minutes later. 

“Found something?” 

“Yup.” Tony pulled a chair over in front of the interface screen. “Sit down. JARVIS found video from Illinois, and you’re not going to like it.” 

Steve looked puzzled, but didn’t argue. He sat down and let Tony call up the video. Tony kept a hand on Steve’s shoulder as he watched, telling himself that it was just to provide pre-emptive comfort for Steve. Steve took in the incident silently, but he shuddered violently beneath Tony’s hand. When the video finished, he sat quietly for a moment, and Tony could feel him forcing his emotions under control. He took a deep breath and turned around in the chair. He looked nauseated, but determined as well. 

“Can’t be any clearer than that. I’m going to call the others. Meet us in the briefing room.” 

Steve rose from the chair and strode out of the lab, his hands balled into tight fists. Tony paused just long enough to set JARVIS to work making sure that his suit was combat ready before following Steve out into the corridor.


	2. The Demand Of The Hour

  1. **The Demand Of The Hour**



  

 

The team sat in stunned silence for a moment after the video ended. Tony was impressed. In a way, it was comforting to know that, even after the wide variety of difficult, painful, and downright bizarre things that they had all seen and done over the years, they could still respond like actual human beings every once in a while. Of course, it was equally comforting to know that he wasn’t the only one horrified by the scene, even having watched it three times over. 

“This is a bad joke, isn’t it?” Clint asked. “You know. A rabbi, an army of Nazis, and the Governor of Illinois walk into a bar.” 

Natasha raised her eyebrows and shrugged. “Personally, I’m intrigued by the rabbi there. Not many people can bring a tallit to a gun fight and walk out alive.” 

“That . . . wouldn’t even have occurred to most of us,” Bruce said, choking on the dregs of a bitter laugh. 

“I mean, his technique could use a bit of refinement,” Natasha went on, “But he’s definitely got the raw material. If we’d known about this guy a couple of years ago, I’d have recommended him for recruitment.” 

“Except it isn’t a couple of years ago,” Steve said. “It’s now. The gun that the Governor used looks virtually identical to the weapons that HYDRA was developing back during the War, and that SHIELD was working on when I woke up.” 

“Which were powered by the Tesseract,” Tony put in. “Which was supposed to have been sent back to Asgard along with Loki. Got anything to share with the class, Sven Svensson?” 

Thor frowned, with the particular wrinkle in his brow that Tony had learned meant that he was turning something over in his mind and considering angles that none of the rest of them would ever come up with. “Much of this situation speaks of Loki, but much of it does not. The weapons are clearly powered with the Tesseract, and the chaos that ensues is the sort that Loki would appreciate. But his only interest in the gods of this world is that he wishes to supersede them all. I see no reason that he would induce a follower to attack a temple of worship.”

Clint sat up straight in his chair. “Can we play it again?” he asked. “Thought I saw something. My brain’s niggling at me.” 

Tony glanced at Steve, who looked grim, but nodded. Tony hit “play,” and sat back just far enough that he could see Natasha reach out for Steve’s hand under the table. He tried not to let his relief show on his face. The video was difficult enough for him to watch, and he was sure that Steve was enjoying watching the disgraced Governor of Illinois using a Tesseract-powered rifle to blast a synagogue to flaming rubble while screaming “Hail HYDRA” even less than he was.

The video started up, and the team listened once more to the shouting and sloganeering of a protest making its way down an otherwise quiet street in Springfield, Illinois. A commotion started just offscreen, and the amateur cameraman swung around to capture the Governor breaking free of a knot of people and racing toward the synagogue, shrieking ugly words. Everyone winced in unison as he fired his weapon, bringing down the elegant columns and disintegrating the front wall of the building. Tony cheered a little bit on the inside when the rabbi emerged, battered and bloody, and, with little more than a few leaps and rolls that Tony recognized from lessons that Natasha had attempted to teach him, tangled the Governor up in a tallit before the Governor could destroy anything – or anyone – else. Children started to appear out of the ruined synagogue, and screamed as the protest on the street grew louder. One protestor appeared to shout slurs at the cameraman, and the video cut off as abruptly as it began. 

Tony looked around the table. Thor sat stoic and motionless. Bruce looked vaguely ill, and Natasha was clearly still gripping Steve’s hand. But Clint was leaning forward and squinting intently at the screen, as if it held answers that were just out of reach. 

“That protest,” he said. “I think I recognize the banner they were holding. That’s the American Third Wave Front. We used to run into them sometimes when I traveled with the carnival.” 

“American Third Wave Front?” Steve asked. “That doesn’t sound promising.” 

Clint shrugged. “They’re basically Nazis,” he said. “Based out of Taylorville or Shelbyville or someplace like that. Somewhereville. Used to be, they’d talk a big game, put out a cheap newsletter, maybe get the ACLU to let them march in Skokie every now and then. They tried to be the NSM and Aryan Nations, but they couldn’t organize a backyard barbecue, much less anything like this.” 

“You know,” Tony said, “It’s almost frightening how much you know about hate groups. All this, I don’t know, inside information you seem to have.” 

“Yeah, well.” Clint chuckled mirthlessly. “There was that whole circuit I used to run before SHIELD. And then you should have seen some of the missions that SHIELD sent me on.” 

“If we’re done?” Steve put in. He had let Natasha go, and now he stood up and began to pace near the video screen. “So this doesn’t look good at all. A group of suspiciously well organized American Nazis has Tesseract weapons, and unless the Governor of Illinois was indicted for, you know, running wild in the city, I’m guessing that something’s happened to his mind. All of which smacks of Loki’s influence, if not his presence. Thor?” 

Thor dipped his head in acknowledgement, but said nothing. 

“Does anyone know the situation on the ground right now?” Bruce asked. “I mean, if we’re going to go in there – and it looks like we really should – we should know what we’re up against. I don’t want to go green if there are already scared kids running around.” 

Natasha checked her phone. “The cops have arrived, and it looks like the best-case scenario is an armed standoff if they can get in enough of the heavy-grade equipment that the cops have been getting from the military recently.” 

She switched the main viewing screen to a live feed, and they saw one of the American Third Wave Front soldiers fire into the wreckage of the synagogue. Something crashed, and a small fireball bloomed within. 

Steve’s jaw was set, and his posture was rigid. “Suit up, everyone,” he said. “I want us ready to take off in fifteen minutes.”

  

 

Exactly fourteen and a half minutes later, Tony entered the Quinjet’s hangar, suited and ready to go, carrying a small pouch. Steve and Thor had arrived before him, and stood near the loading hatch, deep in conversation.   Thor clasped Steve’s shoulder briefly, turning when he heard Tony’s approach. He looked resigned, and, Tony thought, a little bit worried. Steve wore the grim, closed-off expression that he had worn for a few weeks after the Chitauri attack, when the fact that he was permanently displaced in time had hit him hard, and then again when he had first returned to New York after dismantling SHIELD. 

Thor moved so that he stood in front of Tony, effectively blocking Tony’s view of Steve. “The Captain has told me tales of the ancestors of the foes we go to fight.” 

“Yeah?” Tony said. “Not the human race’s proudest moment, I have to admit.” 

“But one that leaves these followers susceptible to the falsehoods that my brother delights in telling,” Thor replied. “And one that leaves certain of us more vulnerable than others, should we be taken.” 

Tony nodded. It wasn’t something that he liked to think about, but this time, safety came before comfort. “Cap, mostly. Me next. Possibly Romanoff, although . . .” He let his voice trail off as the hangar doors opened, and Natasha and Bruce entered. 

Clint appeared from inside the Quinjet. “Are we all here?” he asked. “Ready to rock and roll?” 

Steve glanced up from his contemplation of the floor, and counted noses. “All here,” he said. 

Clint frowned. He caught Tony’s eye with a worried glance before turning back to Steve. “You okay?” he asked. 

“Fine,” Steve said. 

“The whole American Nazi thing’s still a bit new for you?” 

“No.” 

Something about the set of Steve’s shoulders made Tony suspect that Steve wasn’t referring to his run-in with Alexander Pierce and the corruption of SHIELD. One day soon, he would worm the story out of Steve, but there was no time at the moment. 

“Before we go,” he said, “I’ve got some new tech I’d like to try out.” He dug into the pouch and produced six small discs. “These are trackers. They’ll attach to your suits and transmit location data to JARVIS. It looked pretty chaotic out there,” he added, when Steve aimed a puzzled frown at him. “If the comms go down, or if one of us is in a position where we can’t speak. Thought it might come in handy.” 

Steve considered this for a second, and then gave a crisp nod. “Good thinking, Tony.” 

Tony handed out the tracker discs, and everyone found a place to attach them. They boarded the Quinjet, and Clint booted up the online JARVIS interface. Tony took a moment to ensure that the tracker data was registering, and then clipped himself into his seat. “To Springfield, driver,” he said, “and don’t spare the horses.”

As the hangar doors opened, Clint gave an enormous, shit-eating grin. Tony caught his eye, and knew instantly what he was thinking – he’d seen Clint’s Netflix queue several times. Glad of anything that would relieve the grim ambience in the Quinjet, Tony laughed. 

“Go ahead,” he said. “I know what’s going on in that brain of yours. You might as well say it. You’ll never have a better chance.” 

Clint’s grin got even wider. “Illinois Nazis,” he said. “I _hate_ Illinois Nazis.” 

Amid a chorus of groans, Clint throttled up, and the Quinjet rose into the air.

 

 

The Quinjet flew much faster than an ordinary commercial airliner, but even so, the flight to Springfield lasted a little over an hour. By the time Clint landed in an evacuated parking lot two blocks away from the synagogue, everyone could hear the sounds of a riot taking place. Steve looked up as soon as the Quinjet’s wheels touched pavement, and called up a map of Springfield on the projection hologram. By the time the jet had come to a compete stop, he was on his feet, exuding focus and determination. 

“Our first priority is civilian safety,” he said. “That means people trapped in the shul, and also any noncombatants caught in the action. There’s a compound building here with a skybridge, and we can use that as a safe haven. Nat, you’ll assist me on this. Next priority is riot control. We’re not looking to kill, just to get things under control. Something’s gone very wrong here, and we need answers. To get that, we need people alive and functional, especially the Governor. Tony, Clint, Thor, that’s your job. Round them up and subdue them.” 

Bruce shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “Where do you want me?” he asked. “The Other Guy wouldn’t be much help with the kids, but he’s not exactly crowd control, either.” 

Steve nodded. “I know. Your job is backup – the swing role, that’s what the dancers in the old show used to call it. Wait in the plane for us. If Nat and I need help with the evacuation, we’ll call you. If the others are in trouble . . . we need a different signal.” 

Tony glanced outside and saw a sign for a doctor’s office. Something he had once heard on some hospital drama or other bubbled to the top of his mind. “How about a Code Green?” he suggested. “Say it three times, and poof! Your Fairy Godhulk appears.”

“Works for me,” Bruce said, flashing a quick smile. 

“Good,” Steve said. “Everyone know what they’re doing?” 

The rest of the team answered in various affirmatives. Steve strapped on his helmet and clipped his shield to his arm. “Good. Avengers, let’s go.” 

Natasha released the holding clamps on an armed Jeep. She climbed into the driver’s seat, and Steve swung in beside her. Bruce lowered the Quinjet’s cargo ramp. Tony pushed his mask down over his face, and the JARVIS interface engaged as soon as the mask clicked into place. He glanced over the map of Springfield, and then turned to Clint. 

“Apartment building kitty-corner to the synagogue. Want a lift?” 

“Fly me to the moon.” 

“Dream on, Cupid.” Tony wrapped his arms securely around Clint, Clint stiffened his entire body, and Tony took to the air, with Thor following just behind them. Below, Tony heard the roar of the Jeep as Natasha revved the engine and started down the ramp.

  

 

In one respect, Clint’s estimation of the American Third Wave Front turned out to be entirely accurate. Although they carried heavy weaponry that glowed with the unearthly blue fire that signaled Tesseract power, it was clear that most of the participants in the riot weren’t terribly familiar with the weapons they carried. They fired wildly and utterly at random, setting trees on fire and collapsing buildings.   However, despite the terror and chaos on the street, Tony didn’t notice many civilians being shot with the Tesseract weapons. Some of the skinheads had abandoned them altogether and wielded conventional rifles, and Tony made sure to neutralize those as soon as he saw them. In a corner of his viewscreen, he saw Steve deflecting both bullets and thrown rocks away from a group of terrified Hebrew school students whom he escorted to Natasha’s waiting Jeep. 

Half a block away, Thor had brought one wing of the riot to a standstill by calling forth a miniature thundercloud that set shocks of lightning to Mjölnir, and blew his cape dramatically away from his shoulders. The rioters dropped their weapons and stared in awe. Some of them pointed and asked each other what it meant that the Aryan Gods had apparently decided to attend their event. Tony had to laugh as he neatly dodged a spray of short blasts from a pair of enterprising skinheads holed up in an RV that sat in the middle of an intersection. 

“Something funny?” came Clint’s voice over the comms. 

“Got a couple of Imperial Storm Troopers in an RV here,” Tony said. “Think you can light them up? There’s a vacant lot two blocks south. Thor and I are going to herd the Wehrmacht over there.” 

“Sounds like a plan,” Steve cut in. “Think you can contain them?” 

“Portable repulsor stations in the Quinjet,” Tony said. “Four ought to do it. Six, to be on the safe side.” 

Bruce’s line came to life. “Got it. I’ll have them out in the parking lot waiting. You can just swing by and pick them up.” 

Tony swung around, and as he did so, he saw a pair of Army surplus tanks rolling down one of the streets, smashing mailboxes, shrubbery, and power lines along the way. “Okay, people!” he called. “Their cavalry has arrived. Ramp it up, now!” 

He flew back to the Quinjet, dodging a Tesseract cannon blast from one of the tanks that was rather better aimed than the skinheads in the RV had managed. Bruce met him at the ramp along with a few civilians. All of them carried portable repulsor stations. Tony attached them to his suit with a set of small electromagnets. 

“How’s it going out there?” Bruce asked. “Are we at Code Green?” 

“Not yet, but stand by. It’s getting ugly.” Tony glanced at the civilians. “And you are?” 

“Sharon Katz,” one of the women said. “I’m the office administrator at the synagogue back there. This is Nancy Reeves, our education director, and Larry Engel, the custodian. Captain America brought us out here,” she added, awestruck. 

“He’s a mensch like that,” Tony agreed. “Listen, this isn’t over yet. If Doc Banner here has to, you know, change, you need to be in charge. One of you needs to keep the kids inside, and one of you should stand by the communication line. Can you do that?” 

Nancy Reeves nodded. “I spent a couple of years doing communications in the IDF,” she said. “I’ll figure it out.” 

“Great,” Tony said. “Bruce, stand by. Just in case.” He checked to make sure that all six portable repulsor stations were firmly attached, adjusted his flight repulsors to account for the extra weight, and took off. 

Clint was waiting for him at the vacant lot, and helped him to arrange the portable repulsor stations around the edges. When they had finished, Tony took to the air again. “Clint, Nat, get over to the lot and help with ground control there. Thor, with me. Cap, how’s the evacuation coming?” 

“Almost done,” Steve said. “The rabbi’s still here with me. We can – ow! – handle it.” 

“You okay?” 

“Fine. Got stung by a bit of shrapnel. I had worse in the War. Get these people off of us, Tony!”

“Right.” Tony glanced at everyone’s tracker data to make sure that they were where they needed to be. He made eye contact with Thor, who whipped Mjölnir around and swung into the air, landing on a nearby rooftop. 

Together, they rained lightning and repulsor rays down upon the foot soldiers of the American Third Wave Front. The rioters struggled to split their firepower between continuing to assault the synagogue and taking potshots at Thor and at Tony circling overhead. Between the two of them, they managed to force the rioters half a block south. 

Thor laughed as he aimed bolt after bolt of lightning at the northern edge of the riot. Tony turned to fire a shot that would prevent any of the rioters from escaping east towards the Quinjet. When he turned back, it took him one second too long to process the new threat making its way up a side street. 

The tank looked like the other two Army surplus tanks he had seen earlier, but as it swiveled its turret around, Tony could see the Stark Industries logo that had been badly painted over on the side. An instant too late, he knew which model tank was aiming at him, and which payload it was about to deliver. He switched his comm to override. “Avengers!” he said. “That’s an EMP weapon. Thor, don’t hit it!” 

The missile fired. Tony watched it arc into the air above the synagogue. 

“Code Green!” he cried. “Code Green! Code Green!” 

In quick succession, he heard the roar of the Hulk, and a sharp boom as the EMP missile exploded. His suit went dark, and he fell from the sky.

Stripped of power and its connection to JARVIS, the suit showed Tony nothing but the confused bits of things he could see through the eye slits in his mask. He was falling, and then several things hit him hard. The Hulk roared, and the screams and shouts of all of the other people in the streets answered him. With a crunch and a scrape of metal on asphalt, Tony hit the ground, skidded, and came to a stop. 

Everything hurt, something was banging, and he had no idea which way was up. After a moment, Tony realized that the banging was someone trying to pry apart his armor. “Who’s there?” he asked. 

“It’s me,” came a familiar voice, muffled through Tony’s helmet. “Steve. You’re right in the enemy’s path. Gotta get you out of this suit.” 

“Emergency catch near my chin.” 

There was a moment of pressure against his jaw, and his mask popped off. Tony gulped in an enormous breath of air and focused on Steve’s grubby face and worried eyes. “Okay,” he said. “Now get the catch under my right arm. If you get my arms free, I can help.” 

Out of breath and panting, Steve just nodded, and reached over to fumble at the seam in the armor. “I – son of a – I can see the catch,” Steve gasped. “It’s – I can’t – Tony, something’s wrong. I can’t feel my hands.” 

“A little more to the front,” Tony said. Steve leaned over, and something brightly colored caught Tony’s eye. Just above Steve’s hip, embedded in a panel of his combat suit that had been designed more for flexibility than protection, was a dart of the kind that Tony occasionally saw when flipping past nature shows in search of NASCAR races. “Oh God,” he said. “They shot you with something. Get my arm free!” 

Steve’s eyes were beginning to glaze over, but he redoubled his efforts, and managed to force his numb fingers into the catch. Armor peeled itself off of Tony’s right arm. He reached over to pull the tranquilizer dart out of Steve’s back, but found that it was empty. Steve had turned his attention to the catch under Tony’s left arm, but Tony could see that his movements had become sluggish, his hands and arms were floppy, and he seemed to be having trouble holding his head up. Nevertheless, he worked with as much focus and determination as he could muster. Tony found the catch at his right hip just as his left arm came free. Between the two of them, they pried Tony’s suit open just enough that he could crawl out, his bruised and battered body screaming in protest all the way. 

The ground shook as the Hulk landed nearby. Tony took advantage of the cover to haul himself to his feet. He wobbled for a moment, but stayed mostly upright. Steve was still on his knees, fighting to stay conscious. The Hulk roared, picked up a tank, and smashed it down to block a group of American Third Wave Front soldiers from escaping down a side street. Tony leaned down and took Steve’s arm, trying to pull him to his feet. Steve’s head drooped, and then jerked upright again as Steve tried to focus on him. 

“Go,” he gasped. “You . . . in danger. No . . . suit.” He let his arm flop vaguely in the direction of his shield, which lay nearby on the ground. “Shield. Take. Get outta . . .” 

With a soft sigh, Steve collapsed onto the pavement and was still. Tony limped a few steps and collected Steve’s shield, and then immediately froze as another tank rolled up. Someone stuck a Tesseract rifle out and fired. Tony raised Steve’s shield just in time, so that, instead of blowing him to bits, the shot merely bowled him off his feet. When he could see again, he looked over at where he had been standing. His charred armor emitted a small but impressive cloud of smoke. The tank was gone. And so was Steve.

 


	3. Memento Mori

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, just fair warning: This is where you'll meet some of the more evil bad guys in the story. Being villains, they do not hesitate to throw around the ethnic slurs.

  1. **Memento Mori**



  

 

The next half-hour of Tony’s life was a blur of shouting, hand-to-hand combat with rocks, pieces of metal, and Steve’s shield, and a very distinct few minutes crouched in a corner of a parking lot vomiting up the snacks that he had consumed on the flight to Springfield. When Tony was sure that his stomach had absolutely nothing left to show for itself, he stood up, wiped his mouth, and looked around. The street was much calmer than it had been, except for an incoming fleet of mounted police and the minor tremors and grunts that meant that the Hulk was still around somewhere. 

Natasha found him and waved. Clint and Thor hurried over. “We got enough of them,” Natasha said without preamble. “They’ve stopped fighting, and the cops are arresting the leaders and dispersing the rest.” 

Tony nodded. “The Governor?” 

“Broke his arm when the rabbi took him down,” Clint said. “The cops set up a field triage station, and they’re keeping him there for us.” 

“Good.” What else had Steve said was a priority? “Civilians?” 

Thor glanced around and sighed. “Some were injured, but none of the young ones, I think. The leader – I have forgotten the title you give him.” 

“Rabbi,” Natasha said. 

“Yes. The rabbi is dead. He leaped from cover too soon, with naught but a shawl as a weapon. It was a brave act, but the power of the Tesseract was too great.” 

“Damn.” Tony scrubbed his hand over his eyes. “Okay. Banner is still . . . altered. Anyone found Cap?” 

Clint shook his head. “He’s MIA. We looked all around where he was last. Thor did an aerial sweep.” 

“Best guess is that someone took him,” Natasha said. 

Tony hissed in frustration. “That’s bad. He was out cold from poison, which means that he’s probably in a whole lot of trouble right about now.” 

“Poison?” Thor asked. 

“Yeah.” Tony held up the dart, still clutched in his hand. “This was sticking out of his back. I don’t think he noticed that it was still there, in the middle of everything going on. It’s empty, and I don’t know what was in it. I really could use Banner instead of the Jolly Green Giant right now.” 

As if on cue, the Hulk roared. They could hear him from several blocks away, along with the frightened shrieks of children. Natasha took a deep breath. “I’m going to try that thing that we’ve been practicing,” she said. 

Clint gave a worried frown. “You sure you’re ready for it?” 

“No. But Steve and I just pulled those kids out of the burning rubble of their Hebrew school, and they don’t need any more scary things right now.” 

She squared her shoulders and marched a few blocks north. Tony, Clint, and Thor followed at a distance, giving her space to approach the Hulk on her own, but ready to intervene if needed. She stopped close enough so that the Hulk could hear her, but carefully out of his long arm’s reach. 

“Hey, big guy,” she called, her voice more casual than her tense posture implied. The Hulk swung around at the sound and focused on her. She swallowed, but stood her ground. “Sun’s getting real low.” 

The Hulk looked puzzled, but he didn’t move. Natasha held out her hand. After a pause that was really much longer than Tony would have liked, the Hulk laid his hand gently on top of hers and then turned away. He grunted, staggered a bit, and moved to collapse behind a rhododendron, shrinking even as he fell. In a few moments, he was just Bruce Banner lying dazed and disoriented in someone’s front yard. Thor helped him to his feet, and Clint blew out a breath and clapped Natasha on the shoulder. The Hebrew school children had watched the whole performance in fascinated silence. One little girl grinned broadly. “That was so cool!” she cried. 

Natasha flashed a quick, tired smile. “Yeah,” she said softly. “Yeah, it was.” 

Tony glanced at the remnants of the team, realizing that they were all waiting for Steve to tell them what to do next. Vowing to unleash a world of pain upon whatever Illinois Nazi had hauled Steve off to Lord-knew-where, Tony scrubbed a hand over his face. “Okay,” he said. “Um. Thor, can you take care of Bruce? Maybe get him back to the Quinjet, get him some water, something like that. Speaking of which, there are probably some repairs, and JARVIS will need to be rebooted. Clint, can you start figuring out what needs to be done?” 

“Sure,” Clint said. “I can take care of minor repairs, too.” 

“Good. Keep me updated, and I’ll come back and help you as soon as I can. Nat, you and I are going to have a little chat with the Governor, see what he has to say about this mess we’re in.”

  

 

An hour later, Tony and Natasha returned to the parking lot in silence. Tony glanced at the ruins of the synagogue as they passed it, and then turned away. A bloody tallit still lay crumpled on the floor. 

“That wasn’t right,” Natasha said. 

“Understatement of the century, there, Nat.” 

“No.” Natasha looked around. “I mean . . . none of this is right and just. I’m talking about the Governor. There was something wrong with him.” 

“He attacked a synagogue in broad daylight with a Tesseract pistol,” Tony said. “When we get back home, I’m going to put that up on Wikipedia as an example of the concept of Wrong.” 

Natasha seized his arm in a surprisingly powerful grip. “Tony. Listen to me. Something is messed up inside his head. I don’t think he even realizes that anything’s happened.” 

“The totally destroyed synagogue a mile away from the state house wasn’t obvious?” 

“Oh, he picked up on that,” Natasha said. “Especially after you hauled him outside to look at it. He just didn’t seem to understand how it had happened, and I honestly don’t think he was conscious of being involved. Which suggests –“ 

“Mind control,” Tony finished. “Great. Just how I wanted this day to go.” 

Natasha looked grim. “Looks like we found out where Loki’s gone. Do you want to break the news to Thor, or shall I?” 

“You do it,” Tony said. “I’m going to have a chat with our resident expert in Asgardian mind screws.”

 

 

Clint took the news far better than Tony had hoped. He set his jaw and swore fluently, but didn’t stop the work that he was doing on the Quinjet’s navigational system. Tony decided that the conversation they were about to have would be easier if they both had something to occupy their hands. So he sat in the pilot’s seat and began his own work rebooting JARVIS and running diagnostics on the controls. 

“For what it’s worth,” Clint said, “I believe him.” 

“That he had no idea that shooting up civilians was, you know, wrong?” 

Clint tightened some wires that had been jarred loose in the shock wave. “Pretty much. I’m not saying he’s a saint – hell, he’s the Governor of Illinois, which is pretty much code for ‘pre-felon.’ But it screws with your perspective, you know? You have your mission, and it’s . . . well, it’s the only thing that matters. Anything that you have to do in order to accomplish your mission. It just sort of . . . has to happen. And sometimes it’s unfortunate, but what can you do? All you can think of is the mission.” 

“Doesn’t sound like fun.” Tony pressed a button, and the Quinjet’s display screen lit up. “JARVIS, you there?” 

“I am here,” came the smooth voice. “I believe I am functioning at eighty-seven percent efficiency.” 

“Much like our friend the Governor,” Clint said. “Okay, the physical system is repaired. I’m going to hook it up to JARVIS now.” He snapped a plug into place, and a moment later, Tony heard the soft, high-pitched whine of a connection being made. 

“JARVIS,” he said. “What is best in life?” 

“Crush your enemies,” JARVIS replied, as coolly as if he were reporting on the weather, “see them driven before you, and hear the lamentation of their women.” 

Clint flashed a humorless smile. “Sounds like we’re good to go,” he said. “I can’t promise barrel rolls or loop-the-loops, but we can get home.” 

“Great.” Tony stood up and stretched. “You take the pilot’s seat, but stand by. I’ll go out and round up the others. I don’t think we’re quite ready to leave yet.”

  

 

Thor had parked Bruce in the shade of a tree on someone’s lawn, and they were both enjoying drinks that the homeowner had brought them, and, in Bruce’s case, a clean pair of extra shorts. Bruce smiled wearily when Tony approached. 

“So that worked okay,” he said. “I’m going to have to work on the outfit, though. I think I can see a market in really good stretch pants.” 

“Yeah, well, before you sign any promotional deals for workout clothes, want to take a crack at this?” Tony handed him the dart that he had pulled from Steve’s back. 

Bruce set down his drink, which was an alarming shade of blue, and took the dart. He held it gingerly, turning it around in his hands. “Looks like the darts that African park rangers use for radio-tagging large animals. Where’d you get it?” 

“Pulled it out of Steve.” 

Bruce’s eyebrows shot up. “Well, that probably rained on his parade a bit. How’s he doing?” 

“Missing.” 

Thor let out a little growl. “The Captain is in the hands of the enemy.” 

Tony nodded. “Pretty much. And, you know, just in case that wasn’t bad enough, Steve Rogers is in the hands of Nazis.” 

“Yeah.” Bruce’s eyes grew cold as he considered the full implications of that statement. “And pumped full of a frankly enormous dose of something that I’m fairly sure is usually used to subdue a rhinoceros.” 

“He is nowhere to be found on the field of battle,” Thor said. “I have searched.” 

“But he’s got a tracker.” Bruce sat up a little straighter, remembering. “We all do. At least, I did. It was on my pants, which are shredded in someone’s flower garden. But Steve doesn’t have that problem.” 

“I’ve got JARVIS mostly online again,” Tony said. “Can you walk? Let’s get back to the jet and see if the trackers are okay.” 

Bruce took one last sip of his glowing blue drink, and hauled himself to his feet. “Slowly,” he said. “I feel like I’ve been run over by a truck.” 

“It was a tank,” Tony said. “And you actually flipped it over your head.” 

Bruce chuckled, and Thor and Tony helped him limp back to the Quinjet. Inside, Tony called up JARVIS, and Bruce ran the surviving trackers through the system. JARVIS wasn’t entirely functional – Tony suspected that there was some tiny circuit deep inside that had been fried, but it would take a complete overhaul to find it – and the trackers only emitted intermittent signals. But with both Tony and Bruce operating the system, they were able to trace the signals, one by one. As they found each tracker, Natasha crossed it off the list. 

Her signal was the strongest, followed by Clint’s, and Tony decided that they had probably been facing such that their bodies had partly shielded their trackers. Thor’s tracker had been damaged, but when it did send a signal, it was powerful enough to send an audible whine through JARVIS. That, Tony thought, recalling what had happened when Thor hit his suit with lightning, was probably the residue of Asgardian power. He would have to adjust any future trackers he made for Thor. His own tracker had been destroyed along with his suit. As it happened, not only was Bruce’s tracker working relatively well, but Natasha was able to locate a large shred of his pants draped over the top of a backyard play structure. 

Tony set JARVIS to look for Steve’s signal. That one was faint and unstable, but after a few minutes, a location appeared, several blocks away from where the heart of the action had been. It was another shopping center. Clint notified the police, who sent out a call to evacuate the parking lot. Clint took the Quinjet’s controls, and they rose into the air. The flight was shakier than usual, but it was short, and Clint was able set the jet down in the parking lot gently. 

He, Thor and Natasha raced down the ramp, following Tony’s instructions about the precise location of Steve’s tracker signal. Tony and Bruce waited in the jet. Bruce went about arranging part of the holding area as a secure cot in case Steve returned injured, and Tony monitored the search party as well as he could through Natasha and Clint’s trackers. 

After about fifteen minutes, he saw that they had arrived at Steve’s tracker, and were returning to the Quinjet. Both Tony and Bruce went down the ramp to meet them, and were horrified to see that Clint and Thor and Natasha were returning alone. “Did you find --?” Tony couldn’t bring himself to finish the question. “Is he okay? Does he need help?” 

Natasha nodded. “He’s not okay, and he really needs help,” she said. She held up the remains of Steve’s suit, sliced to ribbons where it had been cut off of his body. The tracker was still attached to the collar. It looked like it had been stomped on, but it was still beeping and flashing weakly, as durable as any of the best technology that Tony could create. 

“Well,” he said. “So much for that bright idea.” 

“Clint and I can go from where we found his suit,” Natasha said. “The people who took him were good, but so are we. It’s only been a few hours. We can –“ 

“No.” Tony raised his hands, and then clenched them into fists. He closed his eyes and reminded himself that he was not his father, that he was absolutely not giving up on finding Steve, that what he was about to order was a strategic regrouping, and not abandonment in any way, shape, or form. “We can’t. We need to get back to the Tower. We’ve got one teammate who needs the facilities there, and JARVIS isn’t a hundred percent. If we go back now, we can get in shape and then be able to do both the search and the rescue.” 

Natasha looked at him for a long moment, and then nodded. “Okay,” she said. She walked past Tony, up the ramp and into the Quinjet, where she folded Steve’s suit and placed it inside his shield. Clint followed her, and took the pilot’s seat. 

Thor remained behind a moment longer. “Fear not, Man of Iron,” he said, placing a large, warm hand on Tony’s shoulder. “I have fought beside the Captain, and I know him to be a formidable warrior, with remarkable fortitude and endurance. He is – I believe that Jane would say – a hardened cake?” 

Tony had to think about that one for a moment. “A tough cookie,” he said, smiling in spite of himself. “You’re right. He is. Let’s just hope that he’s tough enough.” 

He turned, and walked up the ramp. Thor followed him, and the Avengers strapped themselves into their seats for the flight back to New York. 

 

 

At first, Steve was only aware of sound. There was a conversation going on somewhere near him, between a gruff bass voice and a lighter baritone. The voices seemed to be disagreeing with each other about something, but he couldn’t make out exactly what they were saying. There was a quiet humming in the background, and something electronic beeped occasionally. It was a combination of sounds that he’d heard somewhere before, but it took him a few moments to place it. It was the sound of a twenty-first-century hospital. 

That made sense, especially considering that he ached all over, his mouth felt like sandpaper, and he seemed to be too hot in some places and too cold in others. His head throbbed with the low, steady ache that he remembered from far too many times in his childhood, and he lay quietly for a while, wishing that his mother would come and set a cool, damp rag on his forehead. But of course she wouldn’t come. She had coughed herself to death from tuberculosis in 1938, and he hadn’t been allowed near her bed at the end, for fear that she would pass the disease on to him. 

Bucky wouldn’t come, either. He had fled out into the world somewhere, caught between himself and the Winter Soldier, and he had no way of knowing that Steve was sick, and even if he did find out, it was even money whether or not he would be able to care. 

The last time that Steve had woken up in a hospital room, Sam had been there. He had been kind and gentle, and had known how to make Steve feel cared for without overcrowding him. That memory was enough to penetrate the fog in Steve’s mind, and he carefully cracked his eyes open. 

As he did so, the beeping near him increased in speed, and the voices stopped talking. He had just enough time to be disappointed that Sam wasn’t there, and then the door banged open, and a tall, middle-aged man with a pleasant Midwestern face strode over to the side of his bed and flipped a switch. 

Bright light filled the room, shining directly in Steve’s face, and he screwed his eyes shut, wincing at the pain that the movement caused him. The man put his hand on Steve’s belly, and Steve realized that he was completely naked and uncovered. Instinctively, he tried to raise his limbs to cover himself, but discovered that his ankles and wrists were encased in thick cuffs and bolted to the table on which he lay. 

“None of that, now,” the man said sharply. “You don’t want to rip out your IV.” 

As soon as he said that, Steve wanted nothing more than to find and rip out the IV, which he guessed was dripping some unknown drug into his body. He twisted and pulled at the restraints, hoping that he could either break them or pull the bolts loose. 

“Bad idea, snipdick,” the man said. 

Without warning, a metal band around Steve’s neck began to tighten, cutting off his air, and making the pain in his head spike sharply. Steve fought as hard as he could, against all the metal bands imprisoning him, until the lights danced before his eyes, and he could hear nothing through the roaring in his ears. Just as blackness started to sweep into his vision, the band around his neck released him. Steve sank back onto the table, gasping, trying to suck in as much air as he could through his now painfully swollen throat. 

“Like I was saying, bad idea,” the middle-aged man said. “You’re going to stay where we need you to be, and you’re going to do what we need you to do. You’re useful to us right now, which is why you’re still alive. The moment we don’t need you any more, we dispose of you like the subhuman garbage that you are. If you cooperate with us, you’re useful. If you get to be too much trouble to deal with . . . well, maybe I just won’t release that collar next time. You’ve got all those ‘roid muscles, but everyone needs air. Got it?” 

Steve was too sore and too sick to do much more than nod in response. The man adjusted a lamp so that it shone directly into Steve’s eyes, and then left the room. Steve squeezed his eyes shut and tried to think through the pounding in his head and the pain in his throat.

 

 

 

 


	4. A Fettered Captive

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As before, fair warning: The villains of the story will be slinging the ethnic slurs around like nobody's business.

  1. **A Fettered Captive**



  

 

Steve had no idea how long he lay bolted to that table, shivering and burning with fever, his muscles and bones aching, and with a pounding headache from the light that shone relentlessly in his face. Every so often, a man in a lab coat would appear at his side to take a sample of something from Steve’s body. He clipped a lock of Steve’s hair and samples of his fingernails, swabbed the insides of his cheek, his throat, and his nose. He drew vial after vial of blood, and collected samples of urine and feces in ways that Steve desperately tried to pretend were unusually vivid fever dreams. 

He had tried to fight when the man in the lab coat came for his blood, but the man in the lab coat had choked him almost to unconsciousness with the band around his throat. When he came back to himself, he thought that his mind was a little clearer, even if his head hurt even more than usual, and it pained him to swallow. As he lay on the table, taking slow, shallow breaths, he heard the two voices talking again, muffled, as if through glass. He shut his eyes and tried to make out what they were saying. 

“I don’t like it,” the first voice said. “You know he’s going to fight you hardest of all on the last two preliminary tests.” 

“Can’t be helped,” the second voice replied. “The CSF cannot have any trace of viral or bacterial matter in it. You’ll just need to pull in a few security guys to hold him down for that.” 

“And the semen sample?” 

The second voice chuckled. “Much easier to collect when the subject is fully conscious. And who knows, he may even enjoy the process.” 

This comment failed to amuse the first voice. “It’s not your job to help him have a good time. It’s your job to collect specimens so we can figure out what the hell those kikes were up to back in the 40s. I don’t care if you have to shock him, slice him open, or jack him off with your own two hands. We need those samples before we can get the next phase going.”

There was nothing about that conversation that Steve enjoyed hearing, but he was glad to have heard it. At least now he knew not only a small part of what his captors had planned in the near future, but also at least part of the reason that he was here, wherever “here” was. The fever was receding, and his mind was already becoming clearer. He pulled against the wrist cuffs to see if he was regaining his strength, but the neck band tightened just enough to serve as a warning against doing that again. Realizing that it could be remote-controlled, Steve lay still again. 

After a while, several monitors in the room started beeping, and Steve roused himself. In his admittedly limited experience with twenty-first-century medicine, beeping monitors meant that someone would be coming in to deal with them, and with him. Sure enough, it wasn’t long before he heard the heavy footsteps of a small crowd gathering just outside the room. He lay as still as he could, listening to their voices through the door. 

“This is going to be tough,” came the voice of the man in the lab coat. “Remember, our goal is speed and thoroughness. You want to get ready, get in there, and do your job. Everybody know what point they’re taking?”

There was a general murmur, which Steve took to mean that they did know. 

“Okay. Tom, Spike, take point on the door. Squad, ready.” 

Steve took a deep breath and tensed himself to fight. 

“And go!” 

The door burst open, and strong men swarmed over Steve like flies, assaulting him from all sides at once. The metal band around his throat released, and was immediately replaced by a thin, strong cord, and a mask covered his eyes. His right arm and both of his legs were unclamped and then immediately locked into new cuffs. Steve kicked as hard as he could, made contact with someone, and heard the satisfying crash of a body tumbling away. Instantly, the cord around his neck was pulled tight. Steve kicked again, and missed. A sharp, serrated blade dug into his groin, and Steve froze, ancient male protective instincts taking over. 

Someone bent over him, and he could feel lips and hot breath on his ear. “One false move, and you’ll lose more than just the tip of your dick,” one of the men said. “Jake’s real good with that knife, and he’d have no problem cutting you so that you’d cry like a little girl. So we’ll do things the easy way.” There was another tug on the cord around his neck for emphasis. 

“On his left side, knees to his chest, please,” said the man in the lab coat. 

Steve was rolled onto his side, and the cuffs on his ankles and right wrist were chained together in a complex knot that forced him into a fetal position, wrapped his limbs awkwardly around each other, and left his crotch entirely exposed to Jake’s knife. His heart pounded, and for the first time since he had awoken into a haze of fever and pain, Steve could feel terror trying to creep through his brain. 

Something cold and wet swiped across his back, just above his hips, and a faint smell of alcohol rose in the air. With no more warning than that, the man in the lab coat plunged a needle deep into Steve’s spine. He cried out and tried to flinch away, but the cord around his neck, the knife between his legs, and the large men putting all their weight into holding him down kept him still. He gasped and choked and tried to breathe through the pain. Above him, someone laughed. “Well, look here,” said the man who had threatened him before. “Looks like we found out how to make Captain Jewmerica cry.” 

“He ain’t all he’s cracked up to be from this angle, either,” Jake said, nudging Steve’s balls with the knife. 

The man in the lab coat cleared his throat pointedly. “Quiet down, gentlemen,” he said. “This is delicate work here, and I don’t need the distraction.” 

Steve’s world narrowed down to the weight of his captors, the foul breath flowing across his face, and the sharp stab of pain in his back. He could not stop himself from giving a soft sigh of relief when the man in the lab coat withdrew the needle, and the pain lessened. The man in the lab coat poked at his back for a few seconds more, and then Steve heard him withdraw. He took a deep breath. 

“Finished here,” the man in the lab coat said. “As he was.” 

The large men unlocked the knot they had made of Steve’s limbs. As soon as Jake withdrew the knife, Steve kicked out, making contact with at least one body and sending something clattering away. With three limbs free, he fought as hard as he could, using the cuffs as weights to add force to his blows. He thought he heard some of the equipment around him creak, and some of the men swore. He tried to roll off of the table, but a wave of dizziness swept over him. 

That little moment of distraction was enough. His captors wrestled him back onto the table and fitted the choke band around his neck. Steve managed one more solid kick before the band tightened and choked him until he passed out.

 

  

When Tony entered the briefing room, Natasha was already there, staring at news reports about the Springfield incident on one of the video monitors. One channel showed a brief clip of a few flowers and a teddy bear left near the ruin of the synagogue. It had been shot at a distance, and Tony couldn’t make out many details. It passed with little comment from the anchors, who seemed much more interested in discussing the ongoing psychiatric evaluation of the Governor of Illinois and the drama of the Avengers’ involvement. 

“They haven’t mentioned anything about Steve yet,” Natasha said. “Either they don’t know that he’s missing, or they don’t think it’s important.” 

“Twitter has noticed.” Tony held out his tablet to her. “And a couple of current events blogs.” 

Natasha scrolled through some of the posts and grimaced at what she saw. “Well, that’s . . . predictable. In a paranoid, conspiracy-theorist kind of way.” 

“It’s old advice, but don’t read the comments.” 

As Tony had expected, Natasha scrolled further along to do just that. He let himself get a few moments of entertainment out of hearing her swear in Russian, but she stopped when Clint appeared in the doorway. 

“No, don’t stop,” he said. “Seriously, I’ve just spent the past two and a half hours getting sucked into the online rabbit hole of white supremacist websites and Nazipedia. You’re really channeling my mental state right about now.”

Natasha barked out a harsh laugh. “Learn anything interesting?” 

Clint dropped into a chair next to her and shrugged. “Their politics are from the 30s, their web design skills are from the 90s, but their YouTube page more than makes up for it. I think I need a shower.” 

“I hear you,” Tony said. “You can spread the feeling around at the briefing, at least. Then we can all hit the showers.” 

“Or just hit something,” Natasha put in. 

Thor and Bruce arrived, and settled into their seats. Tony automatically looked to the chair where Steve usually sat, but of course, it was empty. He took a deep breath, and tried to remember how it was that the team had come to look to him when Steve wasn’t available. He wouldn’t have been his own first choice for that, certainly. 

“So,” he began. “Just so that we’re all on the same page here, I think we’re in a lot of trouble.” 

Bruce gave a small, tight smile. “That’s the kind of quality analysis that I left my yoga routine to hear.” 

For an instant, Tony was sure that Bruce had spoken with Howard Stark’s disapproving voice. He was about to leap to his feet and impress upon his father that he was a grown man, worth an order of magnitude more money than Howard himself had ever made, when Natasha stood up, treading purposefully on his foot in the process. Startled at the pain, he glared at her. She ignored him, and he turned away, only to find that it was, in fact, just Bruce Banner sitting across the table from him.

“Clint and I have been doing a little research,” Natasha said. “Clint, you want to fill everyone in on what you’ve found?” 

“Sure. It’ll help spread the pain around a bit.” Clint poked at the touchpads that marked every place at the briefing table. The screens displayed a variety of badly-designed websites and images of cheaply produced newsletters. 

“This was the American Third Wave Front two years ago,” Clint said. “They held rallies where forty people attended, backyard barbecues, put out a newsletter filled with bad clip art. They were annoying and offensive, but basically harmless. And then this happened.” 

He played a clip from the group’s YouTube account, showing a crowded indoor rally. A band played, there was a brief laser light display, and finally, a bald man in a suit and tie that almost hid his tattoos walked out on stage, to a wave of cheers. He spoke about the grave dangers that threatened white Americans, including a line about evil Jewish masterminds manipulating armies of African-American thugs that Tony swore had been around even when he was a kid. But then the bald man’s speech took a turn that had all of the Avengers paying very close attention. 

“You’ve heard the warnings before, and you’ve fought the good fight,” the man said. “And I am here to tell you that our efforts have not gone unwitnessed and unheard. I am here to tell you that I have received a revelation! Yes, a revelation! The great Gods of the white race, the divine entities that protect and champion the true Aryan people, have spoken to me. Our time is at hand. We have been given the powers. We will go into the streets, and we will fight, and we will win! The All-Father has foreseen it, and he has told me of our glorious victories yet to come!” 

Behind him, a slideshow was projected onto a screen. A hand-drawn portrait of Odin appeared, followed by a photograph of a transparent cylinder containing an object so bright that the camera couldn’t record it accurately. 

“Loki,” Thor growled. “He has taken on Father’s aspect, and he has walked among these humans.” 

Bruce nodded. “Looks like he took the Tesseract, too. He really has given them the power to do what they want.” 

“That’s not all.” Natasha called up several more images of websites from several European news agencies. “These are from the past six months. Loki is exploiting old prejudices, and inciting war. And he’s doling out some serious weapons for that war.” 

“Looks like Steve and that synagogue were the first casualties,” Clint said.

There was a moment of awkward silence around the table. Bruce was the first to break it. He cleared his throat hesitantly. “Er . . . don’t mean to be rude here,” he said, “but . . . how much does the general public know . . . about Steve? I mean, we know. And his synagogue here in New York does. But.” 

Tony caught Natasha’s worried glance. “It’s not on his Wikipedia page or anything,” Tony said. “But I think it’s in his old Army records. Discreetly hidden away, of course.” He had a distinct memory of being very little and asking his father about a picture he’d found of Captain America hanging an ornament on a Christmas tree. Howard had gotten a faraway look in his eyes, and had explained that Captain America was meant to represent all Americans, and that he wasn’t supposed to be anything in particular.

“SHIELD had it on file, too,” Natasha said. “It was part of the infodump. I didn’t have time to edit it. It’s not written in flashing neon letters, but yeah. Anyone who wades through all the files could find it.” 

“Which means that the HYDRA embeds knew as well,” Clint finished. “I’d say it barely qualifies as even an open secret at this point.” 

Bruce glanced at the projections, and then looked down at his hands. “So,” he said. “I hate to be the one to say it, but it looks like our best-case scenario is that Steve is either imprisoned, or being tortured, or both.” 

Tony gritted his teeth. “That’s the kind of optimistic thinking we like around here.” 

“Given that the worst-case scenario is that he’s lying in a ditch somewhere with a bullet in his brain?” Clint asked. 

Natasha switched the projection to a map of the world. It was dotted with little red lightning bolts, heavily concentrated in Europe, North America, and Argentina. “To sum up,” she said, a little more forcefully than was perhaps strictly necessary, “we have two main problems. One is that Loki has been on Earth inciting ethnic hatred and arming people for two years now, and we seem to be the only ones who can stop him. The other is that Steve is missing, and is probably in the hands of people who can’t wait to commit some ethnic hatred against him. We can stop a war, or we can rescue a prisoner.” 

“Shades of FDR,” Bruce said, with a bitter laugh. “This is like high school ethics class all over again.” 

Tony couldn’t bear to sit still any more, and pushed himself to his feet. “I hated classes like that, all those either-or questions. They’re sadistic. We’re better than that.” He spun around and looked at Thor. “In case anyone’s forgotten, we’ve got our very own Asgardian right here. Which, unless there was something that Dad was _really_ keeping secret, FDR didn’t have. Got anything for us, Thor? You’ve tracked your brother down before.” 

Thor raised his head. There was a faraway look in his eye. “I had assistance at the time, granted to me by my father, who has vanished from the sight of the Nine Realms. He alone knew the secret to . . .” Thor’s voice trailed off, and his gaze came to rest on the arc reactor in Tony’s chest. 

“Perhaps it is not as difficult as I had feared,” he said. “Perhaps, if fortune smiles upon me, I may make use of Odin’s Eyes in his stead, and in his name, to discover where my brother hides himself.” 

“Got plans?” Tony asked. 

“Man of Iron, if you are willing to aid me, together we may find where my brother hides himself. Will you come to Asgard with me, and join your powers with mine?” 

Tony’s grin felt like it would split his face in two. “I have no idea what powers you’re referring to, but there’s no way I’m passing up a trip to Asgard.”

Natasha nodded. “While you’re off doing that, Clint and I are going back to Springfield to look for Steve.” 

“Where do you want me?” Bruce asked. 

Tony thought for a moment. “Here, at first, to keep communications open with the Masters of Assassinology. When we’ve found Loki, we’ll call you in, since you had some success with him last time.” 

“Got it.” 

“Everybody know what they’re doing?” Tony asked. 

The team straightened their spines. Natasha’s mouth curled into a little smile. “Break’s over,” she said. “Time to get to work.”

 

 

Steve knew that he had returned to consciousness because his head and his throat both hurt. He wiggled and shifted his shoulders to see if that might help ease the headache, or at least move the pain around a little bit. As he did so, he heard a small but distinct thump from his right wrist, and froze. Nothing happened, so he moved his wrist again. The cuff rocked a little bit. His captors had left his blindfold on, so Steve couldn’t see exactly what was going on, but he kept moving his wrist and listening to the sounds that he produced. 

It appeared that the bolts that fastened the cuff to the table were loose. Without being able to look at them, Steve had no way of knowing whether that was just a mistake that his captors had made, or whether the cuff or the bolt were damaged in some way. But, he decided, even if they weren’t damaged, he could change that with enough patient work. No one seemed to have noticed him testing the cuff before – in fact, the whole room seemed much quieter than it had been – but he was still careful to be as subtle as possible when he resumed worrying at the cuff. Every few seconds, he stopped and lay still, breathing shallowly and straining to hear any ghost of a voice or footstep, but nothing came. 

After a few rounds of this, the bolts in the cuff rattled. One of them snapped, and fell to the floor, and the other one gave way immediately afterward. Steve’s right hand was free. He reached up and pulled the blindfold off of his face, making sure to shut his eyes first. When he cracked them open, there was no light shining in his face. The room was dark except for the dim glow of a few monitor screens. It appeared that it was the middle of a graveyard shift, and either his captors were arrogantly overconfident about the force of the cuffs or they had far fewer personnel available than he had thought. No one was watching him at the moment. 

This was a stroke of fortune that Steve was not about to waste. There was no telling how long he had been unobserved, or how long it would be until someone returned to check on him. As much as he wanted to lie back and wait for his headache and sore throat to go away, he had to act now, with as much physical strength as he could muster. 

The first thing that he did was to pull the choke band off of his neck. It came loose more easily than he had expected, and he flung it away into the darkness of the room, where it crashed against something glass and then fell to the floor. Steve allowed himself ten breaths to rest, and then began working at the cuff on his left wrist. That one proved harder to rip free than the first cuff, but he had the advantage of a free, weighted right hand to help. In the course of freeing his left hand, he disengaged the IV port from his left elbow, pressing down hard on the vein until it stopped bleeding. 

Sitting up proved to be more of a challenge than Steve had expected. His headache spiked, and he feared he would pass out again from dizziness and nausea. He gave himself another ten breaths and then tried to sit up again, more slowly this time. He was still dizzy, but at least he no longer felt as though he would retch. Another ten breaths allowed him to adjust to the feeling of sitting up, and then he began to work on the leg cuffs. As he worked, he saw something that gave him the first hope he had had since Thor had arrived in New York. 

The bolts that fastened the cuffs to the table were damaged. Clearly, the fight that he had put up earlier had not been entirely in vain. There had been a weak point in his restraint after all. He pulled the leg cuffs free and swung his feet over the side of the table. He was free. 

The cuffs themselves still weighed down his wrists and ankles, and he was dizzy and sore and naked as the day he was born, but he was alive and he was free. It was high time to figure out where he was and how to get somewhere else before the man in the lab coat returned for his final sample.


	5. This Prison Of Clay

  1. **This Prison Of Clay**



  

 

“Whoa.” Tony stumbled a little when Thor released him. He popped the mask of his latest suit open and stared at the . . . well, “reception room” was as good a word for it as any. The sheer acreage of gold veneer should have been tacky, but managed to come across as majestic instead, possibly because of the way that it set off the view of space and time outside the window. A shiver went up Tony’s spine upon seeing that sight, and he was almost glad when Thor took his elbow and gently turned him around. 

“Man of Iron, I present you to Heimdall, the Watcher of Worlds, gatekeeper of Asgard.” 

Heimdall was just as tall as Thor, but his golden helmet crowned with wings made him seem taller. His golden eyes shone as he acknowledged Tony with a gracious nod of his head. 

“Welcome,” he said, in a commanding baritone that made Tony think of a well-tuned Aston Martin. “I am told that you seek to discover the traitor Loki.” 

“Yeah.” Tony glanced around, but found his gaze drawn back to Heimdall. “Um . . . Thor told me about you. Said that you can see every living being in, like, everywhere. Do you know where Loki is?” 

“Alas, no,” Heimdall rumbled. “Though I see all, I can be deceived. And Loki is skilled in the art of deception. 

“And Heimdall’s sight will not avail us once we have left this realm,” Thor added. “Here, we will craft the beacon that will lead us to Loki, no matter what form he has taken.” 

Tony forgot to be nervous at all upon hearing that. “That sounds like fun. Can I watch?” 

Both Thor and Heimdall stared at him for a moment, and then burst out laughing. Tony glanced from one to the other, mildly puzzled. Thor clapped him on the back, and Tony was very glad that his suit had stabilizers. 

“You will do more than watch,” Thor assured him. “You will have the best vantage point you could hope to have.”

 

 

Clint set the Quinjet down on the runway that the Springfield airport had reserved for them. As he shut down the craft’s engines, Natasha booted up the portable JARVIS interface panel and installed it in the Jeep. Clint double-checked his selection of arrows and put an extra charger for Natasha’s Widow’s Bites in a compartment at the bottom of his quiver. Then, at Natasha’s signal, he lowered the ramp of the Quinjet. Natasha drove the Jeep out and parked it a few feet away, waiting for Clint to exit the plane and join her. 

By the time he had installed himself in the passenger seat, she had the JARVIS interface running, and was looking intently at the news feeds it was showing her. “So what’s happening?” Clint asked. 

Natasha frowned. “Parking’s going to be a nightmare downtown,” she said. “What with all the pickets going on today.” She turned the screen so that Clint could see it. 

The shaky, blurred images from the news feed showed a tense standoff between two large groups of shouting people just at the gates of a cemetery. Clint saw the banners of the American Third Wave Front waving just outside the gates, and guessed that their opponents had been cobbled together from representatives of various minority coalitions in the area. A line of Springfield police officers stood between the groups, making a noble effort to keep them apart. In the background, a funeral was going on. “That can’t be any fun for the mourners,” Clint observed. 

“It’s the rabbi who was killed in the fight at the synagogue,” Natasha said. “He should have been buried the day after, but the city didn’t release his body right away. Somehow, these clowns found out when the service was, and decided to show up.” 

“They are frighteningly organized,” Clint said. “Two years ago, they would have talked about this, but they’d never have been able to make it actually happen.” 

“Well, they’re here now. Won’t be able to get through that crowd with any sort of subtlety.” Natasha switched to a map of Springfield. “If I take Browning Road to the fairgrounds, I can get onto 55.” 

Clint buckled his seatbelt for the drive. “You don’t want to go in and see if we can break up the protest on the way?” 

Natasha shook her head and started the Jeep. “The Nazis are loud, but the ones out there are not our problem today. The cops have it under control so far. We’re just going to get to that shopping center and try to find out what happened to Steve.” 

“And once we’ve found out?” 

She shrugged. “Depends on what sort of shape he’s in. Now, pay attention to the road, in case you have to drive back.”

 

  

The first thing that Steve did was to examine the room in which he had been held. What he had assumed to be a hospital room turned out to be more of a laboratory, and the table where he had been lying was an operating table. He allowed himself a moment to shudder in horror at the idea of what they might have been planning to do to him on that table, but then turned his attention to more practical problems. Where there was an operating table, there were surgeons, and therefore surgical gowns. A quick search of some drawers on the far side of the room yielded a package of sterile drapes. Steve tore it open and spent a few minutes wrapping and twisting the drapes around his body, crazily wishing that he had actually asked his Hebrew school teacher how exactly one girded up one’s loins. Eventually, he managed an arrangement that allowed him to move without being entirely naked. 

The door was locked, but Steve broke it open with a well-placed shove of his shoulder. He padded out into the corridor beyond, barefoot and walking a little bit awkwardly so that the ankle cuffs would not clank against each other and give him away. The corridor was dark, but a light glowed at the end of it, so Steve approached it to investigate. The light turned out to be coming from another room. The door was shut, but Steve could hear the voices of the man in the lab coat and his colleague. He ducked below the window in the door and settled in to listen. 

“No, I’m not worried,” the man in the lab coat said. “I think the preliminary testing is going just fine. We’re on schedule with the samples, just the semen sample left. And the group A strep test worked like a charm.” 

“You think that’s the way to go for containment, then?” 

“I do. I mean, look. Neither one of them is a kid, so we have to adjust the dosage. But we found one that worked well enough on Rogers. Should only take a few modifications to contain the other one as well.” 

For one horrible moment, Steve feared that one of his teammates was also a prisoner somewhere else in the facility. But then he spotted a HYDRA logo painted discreetly on the door, in a shade of industrial gray only slightly paler than the door itself, and things began to slot into place in his mind. The man in the lab coat had experimented with a toxin to keep him weak, delirious from fever, and controllable. And all of the samples that he had taken – or was planning to take – could serve the purpose of finding out how Erskine’s serum had affected Steve’s cellular structure. The man in the lab coat was trying to discover how to control a serum-enhanced body. As far as Steve knew, there was only one person who could possibly be the “other one.” 

HYDRA was trying to hunt down Bucky Barnes, and the man in the lab coat was looking for a way to regain control over him. 

The shock of that idea propelled Steve into action. He pulled himself off of the floor and resumed his trek through the darkened corridors, searching for a way out.

 

 

“Oh wow,” Tony gasped. “Oh wow. That’s . . . that’s . . . oh wow.” A small part of his brain was mocking him mercilessly, because Tony Stark was not the kind of person who ever said “Oh wow,” even when he had been the age at which several of his schoolmates were smoking the kind of plants that tended to make people say “Oh wow.” But that part of his brain was at a distinct disadvantage, and was promptly sat on by the rest of his brain, which was thoroughly enjoying the sensations that flowed through him as Thor and Heimdall waved a pretty, sparkly stone in front of the arc reactor in his suit. 

“It’s all warm and tingly, like a really good full-body hug and mind-blowing sex at the same time,” he said. “And a nice paisley horsie. Give the nice paisley horsie some sugar cubes,” he added, just so that Thor and Heimdall would have the really useful information, assuming that one of them got the reference, which didn’t seem so far-fetched in this universe where everything seemed to flow and connect in new, amazing, and very colorful ways. 

“Dim the power, Watchman,” Thor said. “The device will be for naught if Stark cannot tell me what he learns from it.” 

Tony tried to raise a hand in protest, but found that he had forgotten how. He settled for a feeble “Hey, don’t harsh my mellow,” but wasn’t entirely surprised when neither Thor nor Heimdall deigned to answer. 

Heimdall turned away in a burst of rainbow sparkles, and Thor held Tony’s head still, forcing him to stare into the vast fractal patterns of all wisdom and understanding. Even as Tony squinted at the patterns, trying to figure out their secrets, they became cold and dim, and faded from his sight. The warm tingling died down, and his surroundings came into focus. He was lying on an experimental table, in his suit, with the faceplate off. Thor sat by his head, and when he turned, he could see Heimdall working at a table nearby. 

Thor bent over him and frowned. “Tell me your name,” he said. 

Tony worked his jaw for a few moments before any sound came out. “Tony Stark.” 

Thor nodded. “And what do you seek in this realm?” 

“We’re figuring out how to find Loki,” Tony said. “And, incidentally, developing an amazing and not-yet-illegal high.” 

“And what hue gives special delight to your eye?” 

“Red.” Tony answered that question, and then his brain caught up with what Thor had asked him. “And the airspeed velocity of an unladen European swallow is eleven meters per second. Whose video stash have you been raiding, Lancelot?” 

Thor laughed. “I savor the entertainments of skilled jesters in any of the Nine Realms,” he said. “But come now. Are you well and ready to make trial of our new scrying glass?” 

Tony sat up and shook his head and arms vigorously. “Yeah, I think I’m ready. What do I need to do?” 

Heimdall placed the scrying glass into a shiny golden box and gave it to Tony. “I shall attune it to one of the lesser powers in Asgard, in a place you do not know. When I have done that, you will open the box, but do not release the scrying glass. Let it guide your heart to the force that calls it.” 

“Okay,” Tony said. “It’s not much of a plan, but it’s more than I had when I first invented the suits, and look how that turned out.” He took a firm grip on the case that held the scrying glass. “Fire when ready.” 

Heimdall turned back to the work table and adjusted a device that Tony could not quite see. For a few minutes, nothing happened. Just as Tony was about to declare that the experiment needed to go back to the drawing board, he noticed that he was feeling uneasy. 

“That’s . . . oh, that’s weird,” he said softly, as the unease intensified, and became a distinct buzzing against his chest, centered on the scar where his own arc reactor had once been. Remembering Heimdall’s instructions, he opened the case. His suit’s arc reactor glowed, and the scrying glass shimmered as if in reply. He swung the case around, pointing it in different directions, and quickly discovered that pointing it in one particular direction caused the buzzing against his chest to grow deeper and more intense. 

“Okay,” he said. “It’s a magic space compass, and I’m the needle. I can do that.” He hopped down from the table and walked out the door, following the buzzing sensation. Thor and Heimdall followed him. He led them through narrow tunnels, up staircases, through carved doors, and finally into a room filled with small boxes and chests. His arc reactor was buzzing so intensely that he was sure that Thor and Heimdall could hear it. Whatever the scrying glass was picking up, it had to be in this room. 

It didn’t take Tony very long to pull one specific box from the shelf, find out that it contained jewelry, and paw through the tangled mess of gold, silver, and gemstones until his fingers closed on an enormous gold necklace, made of filigreed links that supported brilliant rubies. As the necklace brushed the scrying glass, the buzzing faded away to nothing. Tony gasped with relief, and then turned around to show his prize to Thor and Heimdall. “This what we were looking for?” 

Thor stiffened at the sight of it. “The Brisingamen, Heimdall?” he asked, with a controlled edge in his voice. “Was that entirely necessary?” 

Heimdall bowed low. “My apologies, my lord Prince. I thought to choose an object that could not be mistaken for any other, and that had been hidden away in a place that I knew not.” 

Thor shuddered. “In that, you have succeeded,” he said. “But it has proven the scrying glass. Let us return and set it to find my brother. There is little time to lose. A fine warrior already languishes in captivity, and I would not lose any of my fellow warriors of Midgard to the force that Loki has unleashed.” 

Tony folded the Brisingamen necklace and laid it carefully back in the box. Thor nodded politely to him, and they followed Heimdall back to the workshop.

  

 

Natasha maneuvered the Jeep into a freight staging area behind the shopping center, concealed by a Dumpster, and allowed herself a sigh of relief. In the passenger seat, Clint shook his head and slowly unclenched his fists. “That was something else,” he said. “I don’t even think there were that many ‘Kill the Jews’ protests in actual Nazi Germany.” 

Natasha nodded. “I thought I was going to have to drive right through some of those crowds. That’s really not something I like doing.” 

“Of course, with these guys . . .” Clint held up his hands in a half-shrug. Natasha gave him a dirty look. 

“It’s inelegant. Besides, I don’t think they’re as guilty as you think they are.” 

“Really.” Clint snorted in disbelief. “What part of ‘We think Adolf Hitler was right’ is the mitigating circumstance?” 

“The part where there were ten times as many people saying it as there should have been.” Natasha unhooked her seat belt and checked the charge on her Widow’s Bites. “You were right, earlier. This whole thing is too big, too organized, and too violent. This crew has the hatred, but they couldn’t organize themselves out of a paper bag, much less get protests to fill a city after a violent frontal assault involving tanks.” 

“So we’re right that there’s something else lurking around here?” Clint asked. “Something that might have been stolen from Asgard by a pissed-off little-brother type with great cosmic power?” 

The corner of Natasha’s mouth quirked up into a sympathetic half-smile. “You’re the expert on that. I trust your judgement. Mine is that whatever is affecting these people, Steve is in the middle of it somewhere.” 

Clint hopped down from the Jeep and flipped his bow open. Natasha came around to his side to join him. He set his mouth in a firm line. “Let’s go find him and ask.” 

Natasha tested the service door, and set a small charge against it. It blew the lock with a satisfying little _pop_. She peered around the doorframe. No one seemed to have noticed the door. She waved to Clint, and the two of them slipped into the service corridor of the mall.

 

 

The HYDRA facility was not particularly big. It seemed to consist primarily of offices, laboratories, and rooms that looked like exercise rooms but were probably not. Steve had tried several doors, but most of them were locked. One of the labs had been left unlocked, and Steve wandered inside, only to find that it contained rows upon rows of cages, most of them containing small animals. He had no desire to find out what HYDRA was planning to do with the mice, rabbits, hamsters, and gerbils, although he did briefly entertain the notion of setting all of the animals free as a distraction. 

In the end, he decided against it. HYDRA did not seem to have noticed his absence from his own lab so far, and setting the animals free would be as much an advertisement of his presence as a distraction from it. He took a scalpel from the lab and left, trying not to look any of the animals in the eye as he did so. 

Upon leaving the animal lab, he saw a large, heavy-looking door at the end of the corridor. It had a crash bar and several signs plastered across it. Thinking that it was probably an emergency exit door, Steve walked toward it. He was halfway there when alarms blared, red lights flashed, and an intercom crackled to life. 

“Attention all personnel,” came a deep voice. “Attention all personnel. There has been a containment breach in Lab 8. Subject Rogers is missing. Repeat, Subject Rogers is missing. Subject will be apprehended, but should be considered dangerous. Approach with all necessary precautions. Repeat, Subject Rogers is missing and is to be apprehended immediately.” 

Steve gave up trying to walk quietly, and ran as fast as he could toward the emergency exit. The signs warned him that the door was alarmed, but he paid no attention. HYDRA was already coming after him. He could hear the shouts and the thunder of boots as someone spotted him. The cuffs on his ankles slowed him down, and the patrol was almost on top of him by the time he reached the door. He shoved it open, and was momentarily blinded by brilliant light. It was noon, not midnight, as he had thought. 

He had just enough time to register the warmth of the sun on his face when several large men jumped on him from behind. They shouted and swore, and he fought them for all he was worth, slicing wildly around him with the scalpel. He knew that he tore some clothing, and he thought that he might have inflicted some minor injuries with it. Mostly, he used his wrist and ankle cuffs as weights, kicking and hitting whoever tried to come close. 

“This is what he did in the lab,” someone yelled, and Steve recognized the voice of one of the men who had held him down for the needle in his back. “Take him down and put him out!” 

Once, Steve had defeated an entire STRIKE team in an elevator. But he had been at his full strength, not weakened by experiments and disoriented by a strange place, and he had been fully clothed in combat gear and boots. One of the HYDRA strongmen managed to kick Steve’s legs out from under him, and the rest rushed to sit on his chest and limbs as he fell hard onto his back, his head smacking painfully against the ground. He gasped for air that never came, as someone’s hand went around his throat and squeezed. A needle stabbed into his thigh, and the world went blurry and soft for a while. 

When the fog receded from Steve’s mind, he was no longer outside, but he wasn’t back in his lab, either. He was in one of the rooms that was definitely not an exercise room, and the cuffs on his wrists had been attached to a bar on the wall. The bar was high enough that his feet did not touch the ground and he hung there, his entire weight suspended from his wrists. His improvised clothing was gone. The man in the lab coat was watching him. 

“Welcome back to the world,” the man said. “You know, I don’t know whether to be angry at you for escaping or impressed at your escape skills.” 

Steve’s shoulders ached, and he couldn’t quite draw enough breath into his lungs, but he gritted his teeth and was silent. 

“I am impressed, I’ll admit to that,” the man went on. “And it was a useful exercise. Now we know what someone like you is capable of. That’s always good to know. In fact, it’s probably the best introduction we’ll get to Phase Two of our little project.” 

“Got all the samples you needed?” Steve gasped. 

The man in the lab coat chuckled. “Wouldn’t you like to know? It’s time for Phase Two. Let’s take that body of yours for a test drive, shall we? See what we can learn about enhanced bodies like yours. Jake!” 

One of the strongmen entered the room. He carried a set of electric batons much like the ones that the STRIKE team had been testing. Steve gritted his teeth. He knew exactly how much a hit from one of those batons hurt, but he was determined to bear it. Anything that his captors could use to disable him, they were sure to use on Bucky, if they recaptured him. Steve had a new mission now. He would endure anything and everything done to him so that it would not be used on Bucky. 

He clenched his teeth and thought desperately about Bucky’s face as Jake approached. The electric baton buzzed, and Jake jammed it into Steve’s hip. Electricity burned through him, and he thought about Bucky and did his best not to scream.


	6. Seek The Brokenhearted

  1. **Seek The Brokenhearted**



  

 

Heimdall took Thor and Tony back to his workshop and left them to their own devices while he made some adjustments to the scrying glass. Tony tried to look over Heimdall’s shoulder, but Heimdall waved him away so that he could concentrate. Tony figured that that was fair enough, remembering moments when he had been engaged in delicate work and Happy or Pepper had poked their heads in to ask him something. So he went to sit next to Thor, whose face looked like – Tony wracked his brain in search of another word, but there was none – a thundercloud. The thought of spending the next few hours searching for Loki with a grumpy alien who could command the weather did not appeal; for all Tony knew, Thor might actually start walking around with his own personal raincloud over his head. So he put on his best friendly smile. 

“So what’s eating you?” 

Thor looked startled, but did not return Tony’s smile. “Nothing you need fear. A memory has disturbed me, but I will lay it to rest.” 

“You weren’t expecting to see that necklace,” Tony guessed. Thor’s frown told him that his guess was correct. “What was it? Trophy? Stone of power?” 

“A memory of someone dear to me, who is now lost,” Thor said, and the intensity of his glare was enough that Tony decided not to push the matter any further. 

“I hear that,” he said. “Got some of those myself.” 

He and Thor sat in silence until Heimdall called them over. Heimdall placed the scrying glass in Tony’s hands and led them back to the reception room. 

“The scrying glass is attuned to Loki’s staff,” Heimdall said. “I presume that it is never far from Loki’s person. I will show you your world, Midgardian, and the glass may tell you where to look.” 

Tony gripped the scrying glass and looked out of the entryway at the entirety of space. He wobbled a bit, and both Thor and Heimdall put their hands on his shoulders to steady him. Heimdall raised his other hand, and space spun crazily, zooming and whirling much like a roller coaster, until the Earth came into view. Heimdall rotated the view around the earth, and Tony’s arc reactor gave a faint buzz when Europe came into view. 

Tony gave Heimdall directions, and they drew in closer and closer. The buzzing in the arc reactor grew stronger or weaker as they searched, until Tony managed to focus it on one city that made his entire chest tingle. 

“Vilnius, Lithuania,” he said. “Why Vilnius?” 

“Why not?” Thor answered. “Loki’s reasoning is not sound. He will go where he thinks he can cause the most chaos.” 

“Well, that’s where we want to go,” Tony said. “We stop off in New York to pick up Bruce, and then the three of us are going to Lithuania.”

 

  

“Found anything you like, honey?” Clint asked, in his best Midwestern drawl, seated on a bench in the shopping center and holding his phone up to his ear. He spread his legs a little further and draped one arm over the planter that served as the back of the bench, as if to encompass the three shopping bags that sat next to him, each containing a small weapon concealed beneath a fluff of tissue paper. If he craned his neck, he might be able to see Natasha’s reflection as she moved around inside the Victoria’s Secret. 

“Still looking,” Natasha’s voice replied in his ear. “There’s a few things here that show just enough and might not even break the bank.” 

Clint wondered what had possessed Steve’s kidnappers to hide any bit of evidence in a mid-range lingerie shop. A man dressed, like Clint, in a t-shirt, cargo shorts, and ball cap sat down on the bench opposite him. Clint gave him a friendly wave, noting that the man was either not an armed threat or so subtle as to be utterly unrecognizable to him, in which case, he and Natasha would have an entirely new set of problems. 

“Checking up on my wife,” he said with a wry smile, nodding toward the Victoria’s Secret. “Said she wanted to buy me a birthday present and wouldn’t let me come inside with her.” 

The man chuckled. “You lucky dog,” he said. “Wait ten years. My old lady thinks that a birthday present is a new set of fishing lures and an ugly tie from the kids.” 

“Treat her right, she’ll treat you right.” Clint turned casually to scan his other side, and immediately noticed a large airport-style TV monitor hanging on one of the interior columns. He had barely enough time to wonder why this shopping center needed any more distractions when he noticed the report on the screen. Police cars closed in on a building that the scrolling text identified as the state Capitol building, their lights flashing. Clint forced his glance casually back to the Victoria’s Secret. He raised his eyebrows in feigned surprise. 

“Honey, there’s an outfit on one of the dummies in the window,” he said. “It’s kind of a green nightgown thing. That color would look great on you.” Which was entirely true – it was a shade of green that would complement both Natasha’s red hair and her pale skin – but it would also bring Natasha within sight of the TV monitor. 

Clint waited for a few moments, making “mm-hmm” noises into the phone and trying to keep one eye on the monitor and one eye on the Victoria’s Secret. He learned that there had been some kind of emergency scuffle at the Illinois State Capitol building involving a homeless man who was either on drugs, or mentally ill, or both, and who might or might not be either an armed and delusional Middle East veteran or an Islamic terrorist. Either way, it seemed worth checking out. 

Natasha seemed to agree, as she left the shop relatively quickly, carrying a small pink bag. She gave Clint a quick peck on the cheek and dangled the bag in front of her. “Hey, sweetie,” she said, with a glowing smile. “Let’s see what kind of trouble we can get into.” 

Clint had a split-second view into the bag as Natasha stood up. He spotted the glow of her Widow’s Bites, but there wasn’t quite enough time to tell if the tissue-wrapped lump that sat on top of them was in fact the green babydoll nightgown from the window or whatever evidence Natasha seemed to have found in a discount bin. He picked up the other shopping bags and stood up, giving the man on the other bench his best shit-eating grin. “Happy birthday to me,” he said, and followed Natasha towards the exit.

 

 

Tony glanced around after the rush of Thor’s portal had cleared. The street looked calm and normal and European, and much less dilapidated than some former Soviet cities he’d seen. Beside him, Bruce staggered a bit, trying to get his bearings, while Thor turned his head this way and that, as if hoping that he might be able to smell Loki’s presence. All around him, cars screeched to a halt, and pedestrians stopped to stare. Tony smiled awkwardly and waved to the growing crowd. Bruce blinked, and turned around in a full circle. 

“So this is Vilnius,” he said. “Nice. Never been here before. Wish we weren’t about to tear the place up already.” 

“Think my grandfather might have been from somewhere near here,” Tony said. The arc reactor buzzed against his chest, not strongly enough to cause pain, but definitely enough to let him know that Loki was somewhere nearby. He pulled his faceplate down. “JARVIS, map, please?” 

A map of the city superimposed itself on his viewscreen, and Tony turned to get his bearings. “Okay, crew,” he said. “Several sites of interest in the Stark Travel Guide. We are pretty much downtown. Shopping district is that way, Jewish community center is that way, oh, and a bit further down the street and to the right is a monument to Frank Zappa, for some reason. But much more relevant, although arguably not more interesting, is that there’s a large group of angry people following Thor’s Evil Twin, and they’re coming right up that street.” He pointed down a street past the entrance to a seedy-looking basement Chinese restaurant. 

Bruce twisted his hands together. “They’re not coming to pay homage to one of the world’s most innovative experimental rock artists, by any chance?” 

“If they did, they missed a left turn.” 

Thor growled low in his throat, and moved to stand in the middle of the large intersection. He drew himself up to his full height and began to smack Mjölnir rhythmically into the palm of his free hand. “Let them come,” he said. “Let my brother come to me and tell me why he inflicts such things on this world.” Dark storm clouds rolled in overhead. 

Bruce’s mouth twitched in an attempt at a smile. “We’ll plan on things getting ugly now, I guess,” he said. “Where do you want me?” 

Tony looked around. “How about that park? We’ll try to draw them there, and call a Code Green when we need containment.” 

“Sounds like a plan. Better clear out the intersection, too,” Bruce said. “In case we don’t make it to the park.” He scurried off across the street. 

Tony turned his loudspeaker on. “Clear the streets,” he said, hoping that enough people spoke English to understand him. “Take cover now. The streets are not safe. Clear the streets and take cover.” After a minute or so, some of the onlookers began to retreat into doorways and shops. It wasn’t perfect, but it would be better than nothing. And they’d figure out the danger soon enough. 

In fact, danger was already making its way up the street, in the form of a mob of mostly young men in blue jeans and black leather jackets, with a few bearded older men and young women wearing hoodies and dramatic black eye makeup to provide variety. They marched with banners written in Lithuanian, which Tony could not read, and flags bearing red, white, and black symbols that he could read all too well. They shouted slogans, and the sound of their voices resonated with the vibrations of the arc reactor on Tony’s chest, shaking him so hard that he nearly dropped the scrying glass. 

Thor twirled Mjölnir, and held it up to draw down a bolt of lightning from the sky, which crashed into the hammer with a satisfying shower of sparks. Most of the mob stopped in its tracks and stared in awed disbelief. But one young man with a shaven head, intense eyes, and a banner with a quartered circle on it continued forward for a few steps and turned an intense, delighted smile on Tony and Thor. 

“Look who’s come to my party,” he cried. “Big Brother’s brought his toy robot. Or are you a knight in shining armor? It’s so hard to tell sometimes.” 

“Enough!” Thor’s voice boomed just enough larger than life to let everyone know that he was something other than human. “Cease this playacting. I would speak to your face.”

A moment later, the skinhead’s form began to shimmer and soften. The banner shifted and became a familiar curved staff, and Loki appeared before them in his full battle dress and horned helmet. 

“I gotta ask,” Tony broke in. “What’s with those horns? They’re too big, they overbalance the look of the outfit, and you can’t use them as weapons with that curve. Are you actually, like, overcompensating for something?” 

“Overcompensating?” Loki forced a laugh. “Hardly. I am a god! What need have I of compensation?” 

Thor stepped forward. “What is your purpose in this world, brother?” he asked. “We defeated you here once before. Can you not learn from your errors?” 

“I can,” Loki said. “But can you, brother? The Chitauri were no threat to this world, not when compared with the tendencies of its own inhabitants. Humans are so much better at destroying each other than even I could ever be. It was simply a matter of finding and tapping their deeper instincts. And lo and behold! I have created an army mightier than any you could dream of, brother. It exists, simmering below the surface, growing in power, until, at a touch, it rises up. It has claimed your Captain, and it will claim you. This world that you love beyond your own, will swallow itself and take you with it!” 

“It can try.” Thor swung Mjölnir and sent a bolt of lightning crashing directly into Loki, bowling him over and into the crowd of skinheads behind him. The skinheads took this as a signal and charged, yelling slogans. 

None of them had weapons that could penetrate Tony’s armor or do much damage to Thor, but they made up for that lack with sheer numbers. For a few moments, Tony was overwhelmed by a crowd of angry Lithuanian neo-Nazis, and it took all his skill with his repulsor beams and popcorn grenades to fight them off. His viewscreen helpfully showed a picture-in-picture image of Thor and Loki going head to head, pitting Thor’s force and power against Loki’s agility and illusions. In the confusion, Tony lost his grip on the scrying glass. It rolled away from him, and his arc reactor stopped vibrating against him. 

The sensation of stillness against his chest seemed like a new burst of energy. Tony threw his current set of assailants away from him, and they knocked down several of their comrades as they fell. Freed from their attentions, Tony glanced around wildly and saw Thor’s foot come down on the scrying glass. It rolled, flipping Thor onto his back. Loki smashed it with his staff and leaped on his brother. Tony used his repulsor beams to cut a streetcar loose from its wires and pen back a group of skinheads, but there were still too many of them. As risky as it was, in narrow streets with Natasha nowhere near to help out at the end, Tony called a Code Green. 

Almost immediately, the Hulk roared and burst out from the shelter of the park, waving a tree that he had uprooted. He leaped into the middle of the intersection, and the buildings rattled, but didn’t fall. At the sight of him, most of the skinheads turned and fled, directly into a rank of green and white police cars that had pulled up nearby. Some skinheads tried to flee down another street, but a squadron of soldiers was there to meet them, including several who actually seemed to be armed only with medieval spears and shields. The Hulk swung his tree at Loki, batting him into the side of a building. Loki hit the ground, and before he could get up, the Hulk sat on him. 

Tony helped Thor to his feet, and they looked out at the chaos. The streetcar wires lay twisted and fizzing on the ground, large chunks were torn out of the street, and several cars were smashed. Half of the skinheads were on the ground being watched over by police officers, and half of them had vanished, leaving behind assorted signs and banners. Loki’s staff was nowhere to be seen. One of the military commanders was arguing with the ranking police officer, who gestured broadly in the general direction of the Hulk. 

Thor drew himself up to his full height and approached the two officers, who broke off their argument to stare at him with enormous eyes. Thor spoke to them in his friendliest, most diplomatic voice. Tony was too far away to hear exactly what he said to them, but they seemed to come to an agreement quickly and efficiently. Thor clapped both officers on the shoulders and returned to Tony’s side. 

“We must return to the Tower now,” he said. “Neither warrior wished to assume the care of Loki, so I offered my greater expertise in the matter. We must leave before their superiors arrive.” He chivvied Tony over to where the Hulk was still pinning Loki to the sidewalk and swung Mjölnir to signal to Heimdall that they were ready to leave. Tony wasn’t sure that “care” was the word he would have chosen to describe custody of someone who had destabilized cities all over the world simply to spit in his brother’s face. But, as Thor had pointed out several years earlier, Loki was of Asgard, and if there was anyone who had a chance at dealing with Loki, Thor was it. 

 

 

The State Capitol building was just a little over a mile away. Natasha drove them as close as she could get to the police roadblocks and parked in a lot across the street from a local high school. She and Clint watched the police activity surrounding the Capitol for a few minutes. Groups of tourists were being escorted out of the building, and uniformed officers with dogs roamed the grounds. “Well, there goes Plan A,” she sighed.

Clint shrugged. “I’m sure Plan B will be much more fun anyway.” 

That got a little smile out of Natasha. “You’re so confident that there is a Plan B.” 

“Nat, how long have we worked together? My only question at any given time is how far down the alphabet your plans go. I’m guessing in this case, E, possibly F.” 

She chuckled. “No comment. For now, it’s plan B. Clothes are in the suitcases, in the red plastic bags.” 

A few minutes later, both of them were dressed in nondescript black suits and collared shirts, wearing badges clipped to their belts and carrying wallets identifying them as Special Agents Nathan Ross and Carol Brenner. Clint put an extra swagger into his step as he flashed his specially hologrammed ID card at the city cop assigned to guard the rear perimeter around the Capitol building. “I love doing that,” he murmured, as soon as they were out of earshot. “I was totally right. Plan B is much more fun than dressing up as tourists and having to pay to get inside.” 

Natasha peered around a corner and gave a wolfish grin. “True. And it allows us to do this.” She strode into the next room, which turned out to be the Governor’s office, and flashed her card at the state trooper guarding it, just long enough so that he could see all of the marks of official status, but not quite long enough for him to be able to read any of the specifics. “Agents Brenner and Ross, here on special assignment. Stand down, Trooper. Security clearance only.” 

The trooper opened his mouth to object, but Natasha fixed him with a meaningful look, and he moved down the hall. Clint followed Natasha into the Governor’s office and nearly ran into her when she stopped cold in the middle of the room. 

“Do you feel that?” she asked. 

Clint was about to ask what “that” was, but as he stood still, he did feel it. It washed over him with a horrible, familiar seductiveness that made him want to get down on his knees and throw up every bite of food that he had ever eaten. It had been several years since Loki had used his staff to invade Clint’s brain, but the experience of feeling one’s consciousness swirling into an endless spiral of helpless passivity was not easily forgotten. “I feel it,” he choked out. “Never wanted to feel that again, but that’s it, right there.” 

Natasha stepped in front of him and seized his chin, just hard enough to get his attention. “Where is it?” she asked. “Help me find it.” 

Clint took a deep breath and forced back a wave of nausea. He turned around, and found himself irresistibly drawn to one particular spot in the room. “The desk,” he said. “It’s coming from the desk.” 

“Stay there,” Natasha said. “I’ll check it out.” 

She patted the desk all over, knocked on panels, opened drawers and rifled through them, and rolled the chair around. Nothing out of the ordinary appeared. Natasha pushed the chair completely away from the desk and tossed the plastic chair mat away. The seductive, alien scream in Clint’s mind increased in volume, and he staggered. Natasha glanced at him and pushed him down to sit in the governor’s chair. She evaluated him for a moment, and then pulled a knife from a sheath strapped around her calf and began to cut at the carpet that had been beneath the chair mat. 

It didn’t take her long at all to expose the floorboards of the room. Clint left the chair and staggered over to crouch at her side. When he looked down, he saw a small trapdoor set into the floor. The scream in his mind was nearly deafening, but he nodded. “It’s in there,” he said. 

He took a kit out of his inner breast pocket and picked the lock open as quickly as he could. Natasha lifted the trapdoor, and both of them stared for a moment at what they saw. 

The Tesseract glowed with a blue so bright that it was almost white, and it hurt their eyes to look at it. Clint covered his eyes with his hands, but when he peeked through his fingers, he could see that the Tesseract wasn’t just sitting in its secret compartment. A complicated series of wires connected it to a set of electronic panels, whose lights flashed on and off in a rhythm that complemented the pulsing of the Tesseract.

Natasha stared for a moment, and then dropped the trapdoor back into place and replaced the patch of carpet that she had removed. “This is too much for just the two of us,” she said. “We need to get the rest of the team in here to deal with it.” Clint wasn’t about to argue with that. He helped her replace the chair mat, and they rolled the chair back over it. It took every bit of his acting ability, but he managed to stand up straight and follow her out of the building with some semblance of authority, flashing their IDs each step of the way. He even managed to make it off the grounds of the Capitol before he had to lean over a trash can and retch for a while. 

When he had finished, he stood up and saw Natasha peering intently at something on her phone. It turned out to be the same video clip of the disturbance that he had seen at the shopping center earlier. 

“They’ve got the Tesseract in there giving them enormous amounts of untraceable power,” she said, “and a powerful, well-built, and disturbingly not-really-dressed man tried to break out of what I think is a service entrance. I think we’ve found Steve.” 

Clint nodded. “Hooray,” he managed. 

Natasha inclined her head in the general direction of where they had parked the car. “Come on. Let’s go summon the cavalry.”

  

 

Steve had lost track of how many times the stun batons had been shoved into his torso. His muscles twitched uncontrollably from all the electricity they had absorbed, and it felt as though an unquenchable fire burned deep inside his body. He gritted his teeth and reminded himself that every pain he withstood was something that HYDRA might decide not to use on Bucky.

After a while, the men wielding the stun batons stepped back, and the man in the white lab coat approached. A broad, unpleasant smile spread over his face. “High electrical resistance,” he said. “Interesting. I’ll have to make a note of that. In the meantime, let’s try something else. Alcohol pad, please.” 

An assistant handed him a little packet. He ripped it open and swiped disinfectant over a patch of Steve’s thigh. Gently, he patted the wet place with a bit of gauze and then traded the pad for a loaded syringe. He stabbed it into the disinfected spot and pushed the plunger down. White-hot agony streamed through Steve’s body, and Steve clenched his teeth, thought of Bucky, and tried not to scream.


	7. Out Of The Depths

  1. **Out Of The Depths**



 

  

Being a tech genius wasn’t always all it was cracked up to be, but there were times when Tony was distinctly glad of his overactive brain. Of course, it could be argued that a Hulk-proof room in the Tower was a necessity rather than a luxury, but Tony was still proud of it. It hadn’t been used very much, as Bruce had elected to try an intensive regime of meditation, mindfulness training, and the code phrase in an effort to keep his large, green side under control. But it did have the unexpected advantage of being able to contain Loki as well, at least according to JARVIS. 

Tony stuck his face under the shower spray one more time before he turned the water off. He shook out his hair and reached for a towel. “JARVIS, status of all present in residential quarters, please?” 

“Certainly.” JARVIS, replied, as patiently as the last five times that Tony had asked. The smooth, artificial voice paused for a fraction of a second. “You are in your personal apartment, bathing. Doctor Banner is in his personal quarters, in a meditative state. Thor is on the landing pad, in the midst of a highly localized F3 tornado. Loki is in the Veronica Lodge.” 

“Well, that’s good.” Tony toweled himself off and reached for his shaving kit. “Better holding record than I’d have thought. Fury would be so proud of me.” 

He was very nearly finished tidying up the edges of his beard when his mind circled back to something else that JARVIS had mentioned. “Hey, JARVIS?” he asked. “Did you say . . . an F3 tornado?” 

“Highly localized, sir,” JARVIS said. “Wind speed estimated at one hundred seventy-eight miles per hour, with a force capable of –“ 

“Yeah, I don’t need to know that. All I need to know is that it’s on my landing pad.” Tony swiped a towel over his face and hurried out of the bathroom. At the last moment, he remembered to pull on shorts and blue jeans, decided to forgo shoes for the moment, and was still stuffing himself into his oldest, softest MIT sweatshirt as he raced through the corridors. He had just managed to get the sweatshirt on the wrong way around when he reached the observation deck. Outside, a few floors below on the landing pad, there was in fact a small but intense tornado that churned up an immense amount of dust. In the middle of it, Tony could just make out the silhouette of Thor, standing with Mjölnir raised. He thumbed the intercom switch. 

“Hey, windbag!” he called. “Put a lid on it! If I get Emergency Services called on me one more time –“ 

Fortunately, he didn’t have to think up a suitable threat. The tornado decreased in intensity, and then died down entirely. Thor rolled his shoulders and went inside, and Tony went down to meet him. 

“Apologies,” Thor said. “I have been conferring with such authorities as remain in Asgard concerning the fate of my traitor brother. He will be collected this day and removed from this realm.” 

“That’s it?” Tony said. “The guy spent I don’t know how many months on Earth using the Hogwarts wand on steroids to incite an international race riot just to mess with your head, and that’s it? He just gets taken back to Asgard, no reckoning, just an oops, our bad?” 

Thor gave Tony a puzzled frown that was either the best mockery that Tony had ever seen or entirely genuine. “I learned a little of the laws of your world following the incident with the Chitauri. Know you of a court in this world that could render justice upon Loki, or of a prison that could confine him?” 

Tony thought of his Hulk-proof room, and the six status updates that he had requested of JARVIS in the past hour and a half. “Okay,” he said. “You’ve got a point. On the other hand, your prison didn’t do such a bang-up job, either.” 

Thor inclined his head gracefully in acknowledgement. “A portion of that blame is mine,” he admitted. “But I have learned from those events and their consequences. I do not think that Malekith and his followers will threaten Asgard again. And should a new force rise against us, I shall not seek my brother’s help. The cost is too great.”

As much as Tony hated to admit it, he couldn’t think of a better solution. Loki was dangerous, and needed to be removed from the planet before they could even begin to consider the question of justice. “All right. You’ve convinced me. When do we get things going? The sooner, the better, as far as I’m concerned.” 

“Then let us begin now,” Thor said. “I presume that there are authorities in this realm who must be consulted?” 

Tony nodded. “And that’s why I still have the Pentagon on speed dial. Let’s go make some four-star general’s day a lot more interesting.”

  

 

Clint confirmed that he was able to pilot the Quinjet, so Natasha sat in the aft bay and sorted through their findings during the trip back to New York. Although she hadn’t been able to explore the tunnels that she had discovered in the dressing room at Victoria’s Secret, she did have the crude sketch that she had discovered in a pile of unfortunately patterned and deeply discounted swimsuits. She was fairly sure that it was a map of the tunnel system, and if she was correct, it was damning evidence about not just where Steve was being held, but also about who was holding him. 

There was also evidence not just of corruption in the Governor’s office, but outright alien interference. Natasha had lived in the United States long enough to suspect that, in most states, this would cause an enormous, statewide political outcry and lead to a small horde of state government workers losing their jobs and possibly facing indictment; however, this was Illinois, and she guessed that the state would shrug it off as just another Tuesday. And finally, she had a brand-new green babydoll with matching g-string panties made of lace and chiffon that was much softer than she had expected it to be. It would definitely be a useful addition to her costume closet. 

When they arrived, JARVIS informed them that Mr. Stark was waiting for them in the briefing room along with Thor and Doctor Banner. Natasha and Clint left the equipment cases by the hangar door and brought the sketch and their phones filled with interesting new photographs to the briefing. 

Tony and Thor told their news first. When they finished, Natasha could not think of a single thing to say at first. Or, rather, she could think of at least ten different things that she wanted to shout at someone, but none of them quite managed to make it out of her mouth. She glanced over at Clint, who was giving Tony a glare that was both dead-eyed and highly pointed, and which really said all that needed to be said. Bruce glanced between them and chuckled. 

“Yeah, tell me about it,” he said. “I barely believe it, and I was there.” He rubbed his hand through his hair. “I am so blitzed right now. Apparently, I went to Lithuania and back today. Via an interworld . . . portal-thing, no less.” 

“No frequent flier miles earned, poor baby,” Clint said. “So, yeah, that was pretty messed up and all. Can’t say I’m sorry to have missed saying goodbye to Li’l Bro. But on the bright side, Natasha and I found out something really interesting about flyover country. Nat, want to share with the class?” 

Natasha pulled herself into business mode and stood up. She passed the sketch around the table and explained how she had come to find both it and the Victoria’s Secret tunnels. She asked JARVIS to superimpose a map of Springfield over the sketch. Sure enough, the end of the sketched path was exactly at the center of the Capitol building.

“That, combined with the news report that we saw, makes me almost certain that Steve is being kept captive somewhere inside the building, probably in a sub-basement, from what we could see on the tape. And believe it or not, Steve is only the second most dangerous thing that the bad guys have got in there.” 

Bruce leaned forward and bonked his head on the table. “Today just keeps getting better and better.” 

“We located the Tesseract. You won’t believe where it is,” Clint said. 

There was a moment of perfect silence around the table. “Verbal clickbait? Really?” Tony asked. 

Natasha smiled mirthlessly. “Ever wonder what makes the Governors of Illinois so prone to being indicted?” 

“You know, now that I think about it, it is kind of weird,” Tony said. “I kind of wondered for a while whether there was something in the . . . oh, no. Don’t tell me.” 

Natasha called up a photo from her phone and had JARVIS project it onto the wall behind her. “Turns out, you were right.” 

Tony, Thor, and Bruce stared at the photograph. Clint looked away. “That . . . actually explains quite a bit,” Bruce said. “They really were sitting on something weird.” 

“And those power hookups look like they’re both channeling and amplifying the power,” Tony said, as fascinated as any craftsman examining a rival’s work. “That’s a lot of power, though. And if it gives off the same sort of mind-control ray dealies as Loki’s staff did, and they’re all zooming out into the atmosphere like radiation, and there’s the American Third Wave Front hanging around . . .” 

“Boom. You get riots in the streets and the Governor shooting up a synagogue,” Natasha said. 

“With weapons that look an awful lot like the ones that HYDRA was using back in the War,” Tony said. “Dad used to tell stories sometimes, when he was drunk.” 

“So,” Natasha said, “that’s our little bit of joy. What happens next?” 

Tony took a deep breath and met her gaze with one of his own. “You and Clint hit the showers and grab something to eat. Gotta have everyone freshened up as much as possible. Meet back here in . . .” he glanced at his watch, “two hours. I’m not Cap, but I’ll have something planned by then.”

 

 

Exactly two hours later, the Avengers assembled on the launch pad. A squad of technicians were refueling the Quinjet and loading it with weapons and medical supplies. Thor, Tony, Clint, and Natasha were dressed for battle, but Bruce wore scrubs and a lab coat. There was an elegant chime, which Natasha always thought of as the equivalent of JARVIS clearing his throat. 

“Doctor Banner’s guest has arrived,” JARVIS said. 

Bruce nodded. “Send her out here.” 

Natasha glanced at him, a bit puzzled, and saw that she was not the only one. Bruce simply smiled at them, and then stopped one of the technicians for a quiet word. After a few moments, the door opened, and a slender Korean woman, dressed like Bruce in scrubs and a lab coat, stepped outside. She glanced around nervously, only relaxing when she caught sight of Bruce. He hurried to her side and shook her hand. 

“Doctor Cho, thank you for coming,” he said. “Everyone, I’d like you to meet Doctor Helen Cho. She’s a colleague from U-Gin Genetics, and we’ve been partnering for a while on some genetics research while she’s been on research leave at Columbia Presbyterian. I’d like her to come along, purely as a noncombatant. Given what we’re getting ourselves into, I’ve arranged for the medical bay here to be on high alert until we get back, but I thought we might need some extra support on the ground as well.” 

Tony nodded, just as if he had thought of all of this himself. “Good plan,” he said. “Doctor Cho, nice to meet you. I’m Tony Stark, billionaire philanthropist and the financier of this operation. We should talk when we’re done with this mission.” 

“Really?” Doctor Cho asked. 

Tony shrugged, as much as he could in his armor. “Why not? Bruce here vouches for you, that’s all the recommendation I need. Impress me on the ground, we could have something going.” 

A slow, pleased smile spread over Doctor Cho’s face. Natasha kept her own expression impassive, but took secret comfort in seeing that at least one person could smile in the face of the problem they would have to solve.

 

  

Steve wasn’t sure when the cuffs suspending him by his wrists had been released, dropping him onto the cold linoleum floor. Nor could he recall exactly what had been done to him in that time, though a great deal of it had featured electricity applied to his body in several highly inventive ways. Steve’s enhanced body could take quite a bit of physical punishment, which he had proved by enduring several beatings and one session with a HYDRA soldier who had carved a swastika into Steve’s back with a knife. But while unenhanced human strength had its limits, electricity could always be turned to a higher voltage. 

At the moment, the soldiers seemed to be taking a short break, standing around a metal table drinking from plastic water bottles, while the man in the lab coat wrote notes on a clipboard. Steve lay curled in a ball on the floor, waiting for his muscles to stop twitching. He didn’t think that his convulsions had broken any bones yet. They had left him unrestrained, and as soon as he regained enough control over his limbs, he was going to take advantage of that. The double-pronged electrical wand lay just out of his reach. If he could get to it while the soldiers were still distracted with their water bottles and their discussion of the Chicago Bears’ chances in the playoffs, he might be in a position to attempt escape again. 

He braced his feet and hands against the floor and slowly slid himself a few inches closer to the wand, gritting his teeth so that he would not cry out at the pain in his shoulders and legs. The wand was just about within his reach. One of the soldiers made a crude joke about the Green Bay Packers, and Steve reached out under cover of their laughter. Steve stretched as far as he could, thinking of the side of a train rushing through the Alps, and a tiny, infinite moment of hope as straining fingertips just brushed his own. For an instant, he thought that he might have saved the best part of himself, and then a foot stomped down on his wrist, pinning it to the floor. Steve looked up and saw the man in the lab coat. 

“And that, gentlemen, is why we do not underestimate the Jewish threat,” the man in the lab coat said to the soldiers. “While the white man takes his ease, the Jew creeps up from the ground, ready to strike like the serpent he is. Jake? Take care of this situation.” 

A pair of combat boots marched into Steve’s field of vision. “Sneaky kike.” Jake kicked Steve in the stomach, then bent down and slammed his head against the floor a few times. While Steve was still gasping for air, Jake and his team picked him up, hauled him onto the table where their water bottles had been, and cuffed him there, face up and exposed, the healing swastika on Steve’s back burning when it contacted the table. Jake glanced at Steve’s crotch and laughed. 

“Not so impressive, are you, Captain Kike?” He drew his knife and ran the point in random patterns over Steve’s upper thighs, threatening, but not quite drawing blood. “Guess they cut the best bits off when you were just a baby.” 

Steve managed to work up just enough moisture in his mouth to spit in Jake’s face, and received a fist across his cheekbone for his pains. 

“Enough of that,” the man in the lab coat said. “Time to get back to work.” He opened a carrying case that contained an electrical control box. Jake plugged its master cord into a wall socket, while the man in the lab coat applied electrodes to Steve’s body, one on his shoulder, and the other just below his navel. 

“Just a little bit at first,” he said. “I want to find the right setting on the box.” He flipped the switch, and Steve’s body convulsed in blinding pain.

 

 

The Quinjet provided the advantage of speed, but at the price of a certain loss of subtlety. There was no hidden landing site near the Capitol building, so Clint set the Quinjet down directly in front, and the Avengers relied on speed and shock to force their way past the guards even before Clint had completely lowered the ramp. He fired a few smoke grenades to give them cover as the field team dashed into the building. 

Natasha led Bruce through the corridors to the Governor’s office, taking down the few guards they encountered as gently as she could. The Lieutenant Governor was in the office, along with a bodyguard, when Natasha shoved the door open. He jumped to his feet, and the bodyguard drew his gun. 

“Who are you?” he shouted. 

“Natasha Romanoff, Avenger,” Natasha said. “This is Doctor Bruce Banner, also an Avenger. Listen to me. You’re both in danger here. You need to clear the room so that Doctor Banner and I can take care of the problem.” 

“Aha.” The Lieutenant Governor did not look entirely convinced, but waved to the bodyguard to lower his weapon. “And why should I believe you, Ms. Romanoff?” 

“Because I’m right. And because the last person who sat in that chair ran screaming through the city and assaulted a synagogue a few days ago. Which may well happen to you, if you don’t let us do our job.” 

Bruce stepped up beside her and raised his hand briefly. “We think that there’s an . . . item, in this room, that might be affecting people’s minds. We’ll just . . . clear it out. You know, like asbestos. Then you can get back to whatever you were doing. Although you might want to go outside for a bit. Might get rough in here.” 

“Is that a threat?” the bodyguard asked. 

Bruce shook his head. “No. It’s just that our colleagues have a bit of business elsewhere in the building.” 

The Lieutenant Governor gave that a few seconds of thought, and nodded. “Come on, Chad,” he said. “Let’s go to lunch, let the Avengers do their work. There’s a bar out past the Lincoln statue that I’ve been wanting to check out. Wild West theme.” 

Natasha waited until both the Lieutenant Governor and the bodyguard had left the room, and then went to the desk and uncovered the Tesseract. Bruce gave a low whistle when he saw it. “All right,” he said. “It’s really wedged in there, but I think I can get it out. Get the containment device ready. And . . . let’s see. Okay. Let’s start by putting in a few shims.” 

They worked thoroughly, but quickly, well aware that their time was not unlimited. Either Steve would be rescued and probably be in need of medical attention, or the building might erupt in a firefight. Either way, their other skills might soon be needed.

 

  

Steve was conscious of little more than endless, searing pain, as the man in the lab coat sent jolt after jolt of electricity through his body. His body twitched and jerked between shocks, and sometimes he lost track of when a new shock actually hit him. He was vaguely aware that there had been a few pauses when Jake or one of the other guards had used a knife on him, but he had no idea what they had done. He was fairly sure that his body was still intact, if only because it hurt all over, but beyond that, he didn’t know, and he had stopped caring. 

Occasionally, between shocks, he remembered dimly that he wasn’t allowed to die. If he died, that meant that something bad would happen to Bucky. He couldn’t remember what that was, but it was enormously important to live so that the bad thing wouldn’t happen to Bucky. So he awaited each new jolt of pain that meant that he still lived, and HYDRA could still hurt him. 

Another shock hit, and Steve’s body burned. He couldn’t remember if he had cried out before, but he didn’t have the energy to do so now. He remembered that he was Steve Rogers, that he was Captain America, that he must not let harm come to Bucky Barnes. And he remembered that there was a prayer to say in the face of death. He’d said it before, and it terrified him to say it now, but he couldn’t leave it unsaid. In between electric shocks, he gasped out six words in Hebrew, chanting them over and over again. The guards shouted terrible things at him, and carved words into his skin with knives. The man in the lab coat sent endless jolts of pain that cramped his muscles and burned his nerves. And still, Steve prayed, the prayer that would lead him either to life or to death. 

He was so far gone that he barely noticed when the door burst open, and Thor charged into the room, with Tony and Clint hot on his heels. He heard shouting, and the sounds of bodies colliding and punches landing, but he couldn’t muster up the strength to do anything except lie on the table and pray. He sucked a ragged breath of air into his lungs. “Sh’ma . . . yisroel . . .” 

“Shut up!” someone shouted in his ear. “Shut up! Shut up! Stop that damned mumbling!”

The cuffs securing him to the table fell away, and someone hauled him up. Steve tried to get to his feet and push away whoever was holding him, but his limbs flopped and twitched uselessly. He thought he heard Thor’s voice, and something overhead exploded in a shower of sparks. 

Freed from the constant stream of electrical shocks, Steve’s vision and understanding began to return. He was just aware enough to see Tony, in full armor, blasting the man in the lab coat across the room before he was shoved into an upright box just big enough to hold him. A metal door slammed shut, leaving only a small porthole through which Steve could see the battle. Clint turned and raced toward him. Then the box hummed to life, and the temperature dropped precipitously. In an instant, ice formed at Steve’s back, locking him in place and surrounding him with the bitter, biting cold that still haunted his nightmares. Steve tried to reach out to push the door open, but the ice crept over his arm, and he could not move. 

And with his last gasp of energy, Steve screamed.


	8. Lift Up My Eyes

  1. **Lift Up My Eyes**



  

 

Steve’s cry cut through the general noise of the fight, seizing Tony’s attention immediately. He blasted one of the HYDRA goons away and leaped for the large metal box just as it slammed shut. Clint actually beat him to it. He reached out to find a handle or a catch, but jerked his hand away as soon as he touched it. 

“It’s freezing,” he gasped. 

There was a porthole in the box, and Tony could just make out Steve’s terrified face as ice crystals grew swiftly along the edges of the glass. “Disconnect it now!” he snapped. “It’s a cryo chamber.” 

Thor batted the remaining HYDRA personnel away and secured them as Clint and Tony scrambled to pull all the plugs and wires that they could find connecting the cryo chamber to the building’s power source. Steve continued to cry out from inside the chamber, and Tony winced at the sound. He almost wished that he had delayed a few moments, just long enough for the chamber to complete its cycle and render Steve unconscious, just so that he wouldn’t have to be awake to experience his body being frozen for the second time in his life. Unfortunately, both the lock and the seal on the chamber were well constructed, and Tony didn’t want to risk taking the time to pry it open while they were still in hostile territory. He could still hear Steve’s cries, which meant that Steve had air, at least for now. 

He switched to an open comm channel. “We’ve got Cap,” he said. “He’s hurt and needs emergency medical help. Assemble at the Quinjet as fast as you can. Natasha, call the State Police and the FBI. There’s a full HYDRA cell down here, waiting to be picked up.” He turned to Clint. “You go ahead, get the jet warmed up. Thor and I will bring Steve along.” 

Clint nodded, and took off down the corridor. Tony motioned Thor over, and checked to make sure that all of the HYDRA personnel were immobilized. “That was fast,” he said. 

“If the Captain needs us, then time is surely of the essence.” 

“You got that right.” Tony considered the cryo chamber for a moment. Then he leaned over the porthole and popped his mask open. “Cap, can you hear me in there?” 

Steve swallowed down another cry, and focused his eyes on Tony. Tony decided to take that as a yes. 

“You hang on. Thor and I are going to take you back to the Quinjet. Bruce is there, and he’s got a friend with him, and they’re going to take care of you. Got it? We’ve got you. You’re safe, and we’re going to take care of you.” 

It took him only a moment to figure out how to transport the cryo chamber. He lifted it with a repulsor beam, and Thor held one end to steady it. Together, they started down the hall, trying to be as gentle as possible. Tony very carefully did not think about how much the cryo chamber resembled a coffin.

  

 

The rest of the team was already waiting for them by the time they reached the Quinjet. Natasha was talking on her cell phone while also managing to communicate with several squad cars full of city police by hand gesture. When she saw Tony and Thor coming, she waved at Clint, already seated in the Quinjet’s cockpit. The police held back the crowd of curious onlookers as Tony and Thor maneuvered the cryo chamber up the loading ramp. Natasha paused to give the police incident commander one last instruction, and then hurried up the ramp after them. 

“They’ll secure the building and the Lieutenant Governor, and stay in touch via comm channel three, so keep that one open,” she said. Then she turned her attention to the cryo chamber. “What’s going on with Steve?” 

“I don’t know,” Tony said. “Let’s find out.” 

Bruce and Doctor Cho crouched nearby as Tony aimed a small torch at the lock. Doctor Cho gasped when she saw the chamber. 

“That’s a cryostasis chamber,” she said. “I’ve wanted to work with one of those for years. We never had the funding available at U-Gin.” 

“Get a good look,” Bruce told her. “We’re going to have to get this right on the first try.” 

Tony popped the lock and lifted the lid. Steve sucked in a ragged breath and let it out as a thin wail of despair. His eyes were wild and panicky, darting back and forth, and Tony had no idea how much Steve was actually seeing. His naked body was almost fully frozen over, and there were a few tears frozen on his face. Half-blurred beneath a thin sheet of ice, Tony could just make out the words “Kike” and “Jew” carved onto Steve’s chest. He cursed quietly, and began to remove his armor. 

Beside him, Bruce gritted his teeth, but otherwise maintained his calm, serious expression. “Get us out of here, Clint,” he said. “We need to get back to the Tower. Natasha, have JARVIS get the med bay prepped and ready.” 

Clint engaged the Quinjet’s thrusters and took off. Doctor Cho leaned over Steve and began to examine as much of him as she could reach. She rattled off a list of figures to Bruce. Tony didn’t follow all of the details, but he gathered that Steve’s heart was beating too fast, that he wasn’t able to take in enough oxygen, and that his core temperature was far too low. 

“The cryo procedure is too advanced,” she said. “And it looks like the chamber controls are damaged. I don’t think we can reverse it at this stage. I think we could bring him back from full cryo, though.” 

Bruce locked eyes with her. “That’s a risky procedure, Helen.” 

“It worked before. And we have the records. They’re online.” 

“SHIELD infodump,” Natasha supplied. “It’s under Project Restoration.” 

Bruce took a deep breath. “If there’s any lab that can recreate that procedure, it’s ours,” he said. “And if there’s anyone who can do it, it’s us.” 

Doctor Cho leaned over Steve again and patted him on the cheek to get his attention. “Captain, we’re going to have to complete the cryo procedure,” she said. “We’ll anesthetize you and freeze you completely before –“ 

“No!” Steve cried. “No, don’t! Don’t touch me! No! Stay away from me!” 

“Guys, what’s going on back there?” Clint called from the cockpit. “How bad is it?” 

Doctor Cho shook her head. “On a scale of one to he’s-going-to-have-a-stroke-from-sheer-panic?” She reached into the medkit for a syringe. “Captain, I’m sorry. We have to do this now.” 

“No!” Steve screamed. 

“Wait.” Bruce laid his hand over Doctor Cho’s. “I think we can spare a few minutes. I want to try something first.” 

“Look at his vitals. He’s –“ 

“He’s stable,” Bruce said. “His vitals aren’t good, but they’re stable. The cryo chamber isn’t getting any colder. He’s in trouble, but we have a little bit of time. This might just make things easier. Just . . . give me a minute.” 

Doctor Cho looked skeptical, but sat back on her heels. Bruce leaned over the cryo chamber and took Steve’s face in his hands. Startled by the unexpected warmth, Steve stopped screaming and stared at Bruce, taking gasping, shallow breaths. 

“Steve, look at me,” Bruce said. “It’s just me. It’s Bruce. Look at me. No one is hurting you right now, okay? We’re just going to talk a little. Can you do that?” 

He glanced over at Tony and Thor and gestured with his head that they should come closer. Thor put his hand on Steve’s forehead, and Tony leaned over so that Steve could see him. 

“We’re on the Quinjet, headed back to New York,” Bruce said. “We’re all here. Tony and Thor are with me, and Clint and Natasha are in the cockpit. Doctor Cho is a colleague of mine, and I promise that you can trust her.” 

“We’ve got you, Cap,” Tony added. “We got you out of there, and we’re going to take care of you.” 

“Please don’t freeze me,” Steve choked out. “I don’t – I can’t do that again.” 

“Are you remembering the plane crash right now?” Bruce asked softly. 

Steve tried to nod, but his head was frozen in place. “Everything hurt,” he said, in a small voice. “The water was so cold it burned. And I couldn’t breathe. And then I woke up . . .” His eyes shone with tears. 

Bruce nodded. “I understand,” he said. “This isn’t going to be like that. That was a desperate situation, and you were alone. This is different. It’s still an emergency, but it’s medical, and you’ve got people here to take care of you.” 

“I need to stay awake.” A few tears spilled down Steve’s face, and Tony reached in to brush them away before they could freeze. “I need to be sure.” 

“I get it.” Bruce said. “Let me tell you what will happen, okay? We can thaw you out safely, but it’s a long procedure, and we need you sedated for most of it. We need to complete the cryo process so that we can protect your brain and your heart and lungs while we thaw you. Once we get back to the Tower, we’re going to use the same procedure that SHIELD did when they first found you. You survived that, and there’s every reason to think that you’ll survive this, too. You’re going to wake up again, and you’re not going to lose any more time than the procedure takes. You’ll wake up in this time.” 

Thor stroked his fingers through Steve’s hair. “If you wish it, Captain, I will remain at your side. You will not wake alone and friendless.”

Tony shook his head. “You might have some meetings with the World Security Council when we get back. I could spell you, if you need it.” 

“You’ll need to sleep,” Natasha pointed out. “But that’s an idea. We can take shifts. Make sure that one of us is nearby at all times.” 

Bruce smiled. “That’s a good idea. Is that okay, Steve? We’re all here with you right now, and we’ll have somebody with you all through the procedure. You won’t wake up alone. Will that help you?” 

Steve was silent for a few moments, his eyes darting around, seeming to register all of the faces bent over him. “All right,” he said at last. 

Bruce nodded to Doctor Cho, who leaned over to whisper something to him. They conferred for a few seconds, and then she bent over to talk to Steve, holding up a syringe so that he could see it. “Steve, I’m Doctor Helen Cho,” she said. “This is ketamine. It’ll put you under long enough for us to get back to New York and start the Restoration procedure. At that point, we’ll switch you to more targeted anesthesia. I’ll be monitoring you all the way back to the city. This injection is going to go . . .” She paused briefly, considering what parts of Steve weren’t completely iced over. “It’ll go right in your shoulder here.” 

“Okay.” 

Quickly, Doctor Cho administered the shot. Thor continued to stroke Steve’s hair, but Tony still thought that Steve looked utterly terrified, even as his eyes slid shut. 

“I wish to remain at his side,” Thor announced, after it was clear that Steve was completely unconscious. “He is a brave warrior, but he has been ill-used. I wish to do as he has asked of us, his brothers in arms.” 

Bruce placed an oxygen mask over Steve’s face and fastened it in place with a few strips of medical tape. “You can come in while we’re prepping for the procedure, but you’ll have to scrub like the rest of the medical team. I’ll show you how. After that, it’s mostly just waiting and monitoring.” 

“I will assist in any way that I can,” Thor assured him. Bruce nodded wearily and busied himself attaching wireless monitor pads to those parts of Steve’s body that he could reach. Doctor Cho smiled shyly at Thor. 

“You’re a good friend,” she said. “He’s lucky to have you. All of you.” 

Bruce switched his portable monitor on and let it bleep for a few seconds. Evidently satisfied with what he saw, he turned to Tony. “Okay. I think the best way to go about this is to close the door and seal it, and then you connect the chamber to a power source. That should start the generator back up again. We need to do that as soon as we can. Is there a power source here that we can use?” 

Tony considered the question for a moment. The cryo chamber’s power cables were mostly intact, which was surprising, given how quickly and crudely Clint and Tony had disconnected them back in Springfield. “I could jury-rig a connection between the chamber and the arc reactor in my suit. It’ll drain the suit, but I think there’s enough power to keep it going until we get to New York.” 

“All right,” Bruce said. “Do that as quickly as you can. We need to complete the cryo-freezing procedure fairly soon, or else Steve’s going to wake up with organ damage.” 

“On it.” Tony picked up the main power cable, removed the plug, and started to strip the wires. “You know, I thought you said you weren’t that kind of doctor.” 

It took Bruce a few moments to piece the reference together. “I’m not. But I know Steve, and I know a little bit about what he’s been through. It was enough to get where we needed to be.” 

“That was . . . good.” Tony set down the stripped wires and considered the construction of the suit. An idea came to him, and he found a magnet in one of the tool kits. He laid his suit on its back and opened the chest plate just enough to expose the arc reactor. Then he secured the wires in one of the gauntlets and attached a magnet to it. “Ready on this end,” he told Bruce. 

Bruce considered the cryo chamber for one last moment. “All right. This is going to seal, so let’s disconnect the oxygen first.” He busied himself preparing the chamber, and then he and Doctor Cho eased the door into place. Doctor Cho checked the seal on the chamber, and Tony set the other gauntlet from his suit as a substitute lock to pinch it closed. 

“Okay, Tony,” Bruce said. “We’re sealed and good to go. Connect it up.” 

Tony stuck the wires into the arc reactor and attached the gauntlet to the rest of the suit with the magnet. There was an alarming spark, but the cryo chamber hummed to life. Within seconds, Steve was completely frozen. Bruce checked his handheld monitors. 

“This all looks . . . weird.” 

“Good weird or bad weird?” Tony asked. 

Bruce frowned. “Weird weird. These aren’t normal vital signs, but they don’t look dangerous, either. I guess this is what suspended animation looks like on this monitor.” 

“I think the Project Restoration files might have those records as well,” Doctor Cho offered. “Is there a way to access them from here?” 

“You can get them through JARVIS,” Natasha said. “Come over here and I’ll show you how.” Doctor Cho maneuvered herself into the small space near the co-pilot’s seat, and spent a few minutes huddled with Natasha over a StarkPad. She emerged briefly to collect Bruce’s monitor, and went back to the cockpit. After a few minutes, she returned the monitor with a strange expression on her face. 

“It’s within normal parameters,” she said. “And . . . apparently there’s some very . . . detailed data about cryo chambers available online as well. I didn’t know about that.” 

Bruce looked startled. He turned toward the cockpit and caught Natasha’s eye. “Does she . . . is she talking about . . . ?” 

“She is,” Natasha said, and ostentatiously turned back to her console. Bruce chewed his lip and nodded vaguely. 

“Well,” he said. He glanced at the cryo chamber, which hummed peacefully. “That . . . explains quite a bit, actually. When you think about it.” 

“Yeah.” Tony slumped back in one of the passenger seats. He tried to relax, but something under his skin wouldn’t let him sit still. He twisted and turned, drummed his fingers, and tapped his feet, and carefully avoided looking at the cryo chamber and its still, silent occupant. He didn’t manage to relax, but he did manage to distract himself enough that he didn’t notice Bruce at his side until he received a firm poke in the shoulder. 

“Hey,” Bruce said. “Are you all right? Did something happen that you maybe didn’t want to tell me about, but that I need to have a look at anyway?” 

Tony shook his head. “I’m fine. The armor is good, and I didn’t take that many hard blows.” 

“Then what is it? You’re driving me crazy. I’m seriously thinking of telling Helen to get a ketamine shot ready for you, too.” 

“It’s just . . .” Tony sighed. “You saw those cuts on Steve’s chest, right? They said what I think they said?” 

Bruce nodded. “If it’s any consolation, it’s Steve. They’ll heal over perfectly well. My guess is that there won’t even be any scarring left by the time he wakes up.” 

“No scarring. That’s good. That’s good to hear.” Tony forced a smile. “Okay. I’m just going to sit here and not think about things for a while.” 

“If that’s how you want to play it.” Bruce shrugged, but gave Tony a severe little glance that hinted that the conversation was probably paused rather than ended. “Just . . . keep it down a bit, okay. We’ll be landing soon, and I need to go over some plans with Helen.” 

“Sure. Whatever.” Bruce turned away, and Tony leaned back in his seat. He propped his feet up on another seat so that he could wiggle his toes quietly, and he very carefully did not think about his father for the remainder of the flight.

 

 

Pepper was waiting for them upon their return to the Tower, with a squad of people in surgical green and a large hand truck at her side. Tony and Thor eased Steve’s cryo chamber out of the Quinjet and set it on the hand truck. Bruce and Doctor Cho exited next. Pepper nodded to Tony and walked past him to greet Bruce. “Doctor Banner, welcome back,” she said. She extended a hand to Doctor Cho. “I’m Pepper Potts, CEO of Stark Industries. I don’t think we’ve met.” 

Doctor Cho looked a bit startled, but clasped Pepper’s hand. “Oh. I’m Doctor Helen Cho, U-Gin Genetics. I work with Doctor Banner.” 

“Excellent,” Pepper said. “When I got the call, I put a team together for you. In terms of security, you can trust everyone. Medically, I have their CVs loaded on a StarkPad if you want to look them over. Some of the team worked on Tony’s surgery, and Doctor Cohen here was at least peripherally involved with the original Project Restoration.” 

“Let me see that one,” Bruce said. Pepper handed him the tablet, and he read through it, frowning a little. Natasha emerged from the Quinjet, carrying a StarkPad in one hand and the box with the Tesseract in the other. Bruce quickly commandeered her StarkPad. He looked up some files there, compared them to the one that Pepper had given him, and finally nodded. “Okay, I think I know how to use her on the team. This will work out.” He turned his attention to the medical team. 

“All right, folks. We’re stable now, but we don’t have time to dawdle. Is the medical bay set up and ready to go?” 

“Yes, it is,” Pepper said. “Right before you landed.” 

“Great.” Bruce looked around until he located Thor, and waved him over. “Team, take Steve down and start getting him prepped. Thor’s going to be observing. Thor, come with me and Doctor Cho. We’ll scrub in and meet the rest of the team once we’re done.” 

The group hurried back inside the Tower just as Clint finished the post-flight checks and stepped out onto the landing deck. Pepper approached him and Natasha, but Clint gave a tired smile and put up his hands. “It’s nice to see you, Pepper, but that’s a nice suit you’ve got on, and I think we smell like we’ve been fighting Nazis all afternoon.” 

“Okay,” Pepper laughed. “Go get cleaned up. But we should find some time afterwards. I’ve got those financials you wanted me to look at, and I haven’t seen Natasha for ages.” 

“We’ll chat,” Natasha said, and she held up the Tesseract box. “But this has to go some place secure first.” She and Clint hurried inside the Tower. 

At last, Pepper and Tony were left alone on the landing deck. Pepper took one look at Tony’s face and walked over to wrap her arms around him, heedless of his sweaty shirt and her elegant suit. Tony leaned into her embrace and buried his face in her neck, breathing in the sweet, spicy scent of her perfume. He remained in her arms for a long time. 


	9. On The Willows

  1. **On The Willows**



  

 

As much as Tony enjoyed the autonomy of the Avengers without SHIELD bureaucrats and spies looking over their shoulders and second-guessing their actions, there were moments when he did wish that Nick Fury were still around. For one thing, Fury would have done a much better job of giving statements to black-suited, humorless FBI agents. One of them, a man who looked like he had never cracked a smile in his life, introduced himself as Agent King, but did not respond at all well when Tony tried to address him as “Agent K.” The other, a woman with bright red hair, glowered so powerfully that Tony’s attempt to say the words “Agent Orange” died an abject death on his tongue. Neither K nor Orange seemed willing to grasp the effect that the Tesseract had had on the situation, or what Tony saw as the significant differences between the American Third Wave Front and HYDRA. 

“You know what?” he said. “Go after the American Third Wave Front if it makes you happy.   Your counterparts all over the world will be doing the same thing. And you know what you’ll find? You’ll find these little pissant groups full of hateful people who want to get together for barbecues and to blame their problems on everyone else.” 

“Who were able to launch a battle with tanks and plasma weapons, and take Captain America prisoner for several days,” Agent Orange pointed out. 

Tony shrugged. “You don’t wonder where the tanks and the plasma weapons came from?” he asked. 

Agent K regarded him coolly. “We’ll be launching an investigation.” 

“You don’t need to launch any investigations!” Tony rolled his eyes. “You need to believe us, the people who were actually there. I personally punched several people who had HYDRA logos on their sleeves.” 

“And we will be investigating a possible HYDRA connection,” Agent K gritted out, “as soon as we have thoroughly documented the domestic hate group known as the American Third Wave Front. Now, please focus, Mr. Stark. Can you think of any possible reason that this group might have specifically targeted Captain America?” 

He seemed so earnest that it was all that Tony could do to refrain from grabbing him by the impeccable black lapels and shaking him until his perfectly combed hair went wild and floppy. “I don’t want to talk to you any more,” he said. 

Agent K and Agent Orange traded an inscrutable look. “We understand that the past few days have been stressful,” Agent Orange offered. “We’ll pause this interview here, and we’ll return later, after you’ve had a chance to cool down.” 

“Sure. Whatever. Be my guest. Run around my tower. Eat my food.” 

“Can you tell us the whereabouts of . . .” Agent K consulted a clipboard, “Doctor Bruce Banner? We’ll take his statement in the meantime.” 

“That’s easy,” Tony said. “Medical bay. He’s supervising Project Restoration Two: Electric Boogaloo. I don’t have any grass growing in the tower, but you can watch Captain America defrost while you talk to Bruce. Should be just as exciting.” 

Agent K got up without a word. But Tony thought that he saw a flash of interest flicker across Agent Orange’s face as she rose to follow Agent K out of the room.

  

 

As Tony had predicted, the World Security Council requested a meeting with Thor. Thor granted the request, entirely against what Tony considered his own better judgement. It turned out that he was not the only one who had reservations about the WSC’s plans for the meeting. Although the members of the Council could meet remotely via holographic projection, they still demanded the presence of a moderator in the room with Thor. They e-mailed a notice that an up-and-coming new military attaché of the State Department would be arriving to serve in that capacity. When the e-mail arrived, Tony called it up on a StarkPad, and brought it to Thor, who was sitting in the medical bay’s observation area keeping vigil over the tank where Steve was being thawed. 

Bruce wandered in after adjusting the brine solution in the tank, and glanced over Thor’s shoulder. “What’s that?” he asked. 

“A missive from the World Security Council,” Thor said amiably. “They request the presence of a human representative when we confer. I see no cause to deny this wish. They have even offered to select this representative, and extol his name and great deeds. Come, see for yourself.” He turned the StarkPad so that Bruce could see it. 

Bruce glanced at the attached CV, and for a moment, Tony was afraid that the Hulk would make an unscheduled appearance. Bruce’s eyes went wide, he sucked in an enormous breath, and a few veins in his forehead darkened. Tony darted forward, his hands raised to show his palms. 

“Hey, hey, hey,” he said. “Let’s . . . no. Words, please. Let’s not go green while Steve’s still out of commission.” 

Bruce took another deep breath. Thor rose to his feet and gently but firmly urged Bruce to sit in the chair he had just vacated. “What distresses you, my friend?” he asked. 

After a moment, Bruce calmed down enough to answer. “Some colossal idiot decided that it would be a good idea to install General Thaddeus Ross as a military liaison to the State Department,” he said. “I guess he’s as good an Army officer as anyone else – I don’t know about things like that – but the man does not have a diplomatic bone in his body. I don’t want him here, in the Tower.” 

Thor looked puzzled. “Is not the man a warrior such as myself? Surely two beings of battle-proven mettle must have common ground from which to conduct parley.” 

“Thad Ross is pretty much the anthropomorphic personification of the phrase ‘gunboat diplomacy,’” Bruce said. “He sees human beings as weapons rather than people, and the sole good thing that came out of my not marrying Betty is that Thad Ross is not currently my father-in-law. He should not be in the same building with either me or Steve.” 

Tony plucked the StarkPad out of Bruce’s hands and glanced at the CV and the attached official photograph. “I remember this guy,” he said. “Never seen anyone else put away quite that much Chartreuse and still remain upright – well, mostly upright. Can’t imagine he thinks too highly of me, either. Sorry about this, Thor, but I’m going to have to side with Bruce on this. General Ross does not have access to this building.” 

Thor took in the expressions on Tony and Bruce’s faces, and also considered the brine tank where Steve floated, cold and sedated. “Very well,” he said. “I will find another path, one which will accommodate all of our needs.” 

In the end, the simplest solution was to allow General Ross to moderate the meeting, but conduct it off-site. The United Nations offered the use of their largest conference room, and Tony expressly forbade the presence of any cameras or audio recordings. Thor did not especially care where the meeting was held, but relaxed visibly when Pepper assured him that she would take over his shift sitting with Steve.

  

 

Agents K and Orange had yet to go away, and there was little that the Avengers could do while waiting their turn for long and uncomfortable conversations. Tony felt as though his skin had just shrunk several sizes. His normal solution to this problem, putting on the suit and going out to buzz the New York Public Library and give tourists a few thrills, was off limits at the moment. He switched on the television to make a little bit of noise in the common area. While flipping through the channels in search of an interesting sporting event, a good movie, or even a decent sitcom rerun, he came upon a succession of news reports, and found himself both horrified and fascinated at what he saw. 

Anchors on all the major networks reported that police in cities around the world had been clashing with right-wing extremists. He recognized the black-jacketed mob from Vilnius, and the banner of the American Third Wave Front would be forever burned into his memory. But reports poured in from Sweden, Argentina, Greece, and Australia as well. Most of the stories ended with the local police successfully stopping rioters, but Tony also saw footage of young men smashing the windows of a synagogue in Paris, and a report on a Chabad house in Italy that had been set on fire. The reports made his skin crawl even more, but he could not make himself stop watching them. 

He was engrossed in a report about the installation of metal detectors at a school in Los Angeles, when the television shut off. Tony turned around to find Clint standing behind him, holding the remote. 

“No,” Clint said, before Tony even had a chance to open his mouth. “I know that you don’t like listening to common sense. And hell, I like the wacky stunts as much as the next Avenger. But not this. Trust me on this one, Tony. This is not a road that you want to be on.” 

“How the hell do you know what road I’m on?” Tony asked, but the words didn’t come out with nearly as much venom as he had imagined they would. 

“Think you’re the only one who’s ever been on it?” Clint flopped down on the sofa next to Tony. “Listen, I don’t have all your answers for you. I don’t even have all the answers I want. But this is what I know. We did everything we could. We found the Tesseract, which, by the way, fricking Asgard didn’t even know it had lost. We captured Loki, the guy who nearly decimated New York just for shits and giggles a few years ago. And we all emerged alive from the experience.” 

Tony shrugged. “Well . . .” 

“Nope,” Clint said. “Not letting you go there. Cap’s alive, and he’s doing really well in that tank. In fact, Bruce and Doc Cho are planning on taking him out in a couple of hours.” 

“Yeah?” 

Clint nodded. “Bruce is going with the plain hospital bed in a plain room in the med bay. Says fancy décor would be pretty much lost on Cap at this point, which, you know, he has a point.” 

That got a small chuckle out of Tony. “So I’ve heard.” 

“I asked Bruce to let us know when Cap’s out of the tank,” Clint said. “So in the meantime, let’s watch something fun. I’ve had enough Nazis for a while.” He turned the television back on and searched until he found an episode of _Star Trek: The Next Generation_. “Oh, this is perfect,” he said. “We can sit and contemplate the glory of Counselor Troi in that jumpsuit until Bruce checks in.” 

Tony decided that that sounded like a plan. He slouched a little further down in his seat and was soon happily swept up in the adventures of Captain Picard and his crew. 

Bruce came into the common room two episodes later. He sat down in an armchair, looking weary but generally satisfied. “Procedure’s complete, pretty much,” he said. “I think Steve’s come through it in generally good shape, although we have to wait until he wakes up to do a few neurological checks.” 

“How’s the rest of him?” Tony asked. 

“Pretty good,” Bruce said. “The . . . cuts on his chest have healed completely, along with some other injuries on his back, the details of which we don’t have to talk about right now. There were some electrical burns, also healed, and traces of a pretty potent venom in his bloodstream. Liver function is back to normal – or what passes for ‘normal’ with Steve – and that should take care of it. He’s asleep right now, and we’ll let him wake up in his own time.” 

Tony exchanged a glance with Clint, and saw an expression of relief that he was sure he had on his own face as well. “Anything we can do right now?” he asked. 

“Actually, there is.” Bruce leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. “Wasn’t so important while Steve was sedated and in the tank. But now that he’s out and off continuous sedation, I think it’s vital that one or more of us be in the room with him at all times. I cannot emphasize this enough. I do not want Steve to wake up alone.” 

“Got it,” Clint said, with no trace of humor or sarcasm in his voice. “You need someone there now?” 

“Natasha’s in there,” Bruce said. “Thor checked in during a break in his negotiations with the World Security Council. He thinks they might wrap up soon, and he’ll come and join Natasha. You guys just be ready to spell them as needed. I’m going to go take a shower and then write up case notes with Helen.” 

 

 

The first thing that filtered into Steve’s consciousness was a voice. It was a woman’s voice, low and soothing. He couldn’t place it immediately, but something in the foggy back corners of his mind told him that this was a voice that he could trust with his life. It rose and fell, and sometimes Steve thought he heard his name, and then there was a second voice. This one was a deep male voice, as solid and as deep as the foundations of the earth. The two voices conversed above him, and Steve knew that he was safe with them. 

His next thought was that he was warm. He was lying on something supportive and giving, enveloped in soft warmth, and that in and of itself was such a change from the last moments that he remembered that he wanted to wriggle with happiness. He shifted a little, and let out a sigh. Almost immediately, a small, warm hand clasped his own, and the woman’s voice was speaking softly, very close to him. 

“Steve,” she said, and he knew Natasha’s voice. “Steve, it’s time to wake up now. Can you open your eyes?” 

As soon as Natasha suggested it, waking up was the last thing that Steve wanted to do. Waking up meant facing cold, pain, and fear. Steve tried to will himself back to sleep, but a knot of panic seized his stomach and would not let him sink back into the warm darkness. 

Another hand came to rest heavy on his head, and he heard Thor’s calm baritone. “You have nothing to fear, Captain,” Thor said. “Your companions are at your side, just as we promised.” 

“Steve,” Natasha said, “don’t worry. The year is still 2014. You’ve only been asleep for a couple of days. I promise, it’s safe to wake up.” 

“Don’t go,” Steve murmured, half afraid that he might lose their hands and their voices, that this might all be yet another cruel fever dream. 

“I will remain,” Thor rumbled. “The Hulk himself could not remove me from this room against my will.” 

Reluctantly, Steve cracked his eyes open. The room was dimly lit, but was just bright enough to show that Natasha and Thor were real. They leaned over him, one on each side, smiling. 

“There you are,” Natasha said. “You’re in the medical bay in the Tower. There’s a lot of equipment here, but it’s mostly just for monitoring. You’re safe, and we’re all here, in the building.” 

Steve tried to sit up, to look around and see for himself where he was. But as soon as he moved, a current of air moved by him, and he started to shiver uncontrollably, clenching his jaw to keep his teeth from chattering. Natasha leaned over him and gently urged him back down to the bed. 

“Hey, hey, settle down,” she said. “You’re going to be okay. Thor, can you –?” She nodded toward a closet. Thor got up and retrieved an extra blanket, which he and Natasha spread over Steve. The extra weight against his body provided an oddly profound sense of relief even before the chill eased. 

“That’s better,” Natasha said. She picked up a plastic cup of water with a straw in it and held it so that Steve could drink. 

Just as Natasha set the cup down on the bedside table, the door opened, and Bruce walked in, accompanied by a slender Asian woman in a medical smock. She looked vaguely familiar, and Steve frowned as he tried to figure out where he had seen her before. 

“How are you feeling?” Bruce asked, with a gentle smile. 

“I think I’m all in one piece.” 

“Yes, you are. I’m here to check on you and make sure that everything’s working okay, and also do some neurological checks. I don’t know if you remember them from . . . last time.” 

Steve shrugged and glanced away. He didn’t like thinking about his first few hours awake in this century, and he swallowed back a stab of pain that shot through him at the reminder. To distract himself, he focused on Bruce’s companion. She gave him a friendly, professional smile. 

“I’m Doctor Helen Cho,” she said. “I work with Doctor Banner when he’s at Columbia Presbyterian. I worked on your field treatment aboard the rescue aircraft.” 

“Oh.” Now that she had mentioned it, Steve had a vague memory of a woman’s face floating in his field of vision as he lay trapped and freezing to death in a confining little metal box. “Well. Thank you, Doctor Cho.” 

“Can we examine you?” Bruce asked. “Real quick, I promise it won’t hurt. You let me know if you’d prefer to have anyone leave the room.” 

Steve shook his head. He trusted Bruce with his dignity, and he had no intention of losing sight of any of his friends before his mind had finished sorting dream from reality. He let Bruce and Doctor Cho prod him all over with gentle hands, peer into his eyes, ears, and mouth, and listen carefully to his lungs, heart, and belly. Doctor Cho even made sure to warm her stethoscope in her hands before pressing it onto Steve’s chest and back. 

A memory came to him, of sharp pain and sharper humiliation as one of the HYDRA guards had sliced cruel words and symbols into his skin. He glanced down at his chest when Bruce loosened his gown, but was not surprised to see nothing there but smooth skin. Bruce caught his eye when he looked up, and nodded. “They’ve healed,” he said. “But, yeah. You’re remembering correctly. You did have injuries there, and on your back. There are photographs if you want to look at them, but they’re . . . not pleasant.” 

“Maybe later,” Steve said. Bruce gave his shoulder a sympathetic squeeze. Doctor Cho completed the neurological exam, which was brief and simple, and she and Bruce conferred for a moment. 

“You’re doing well,” Doctor Cho said. “Your body came through the thaw process intact, and your organ and neurological functions are . . . well, normal for you, I think.” She smiled at Steve. “You need rest now, and I think we’ll start you on small meals, just to give your digestive tract a chance to wake up as well.” 

“Do you want to eat now, or rest a bit first?” Bruce asked. 

Steve thought about it. He couldn’t remember the last time he had eaten anything – he certainly hadn’t been fed while HYDRA had him – but he didn’t quite feel up to the task of eating yet. “Maybe later.” 

Bruce nodded. “Okay. I’ll come check on you in about an hour, and see how you’re feeling then. Natasha, there are a couple of FBI agents who wanted to see you. I said that you were in here waiting for Steve to wake up, but . . .” 

Natasha sighed. “Yeah, I know the score.” She leaned over and stroked her hand over Steve’s hair. “I have to go,” she said, “but I’ll come right back as soon as I’m done. Thor can stay here with you, if you like.” 

“I will be at your side as long as you have need of me,” Thor assured him. 

Steve nodded his thanks. Natasha gave him a gentle kiss on his cheek, and left the room with Bruce and Doctor Cho. Thor settled back in his chair, content to let Steve talk or not as he wished. Silence settled over the room, although it was not especially uncomfortable. 

Safe in the warm confines of the bed, Steve allowed himself to sift through his jumbled, pain-filled memories of the past few days. He had been in and out of consciousness, and some things would probably always be a merciful blur. But there were a few moments that stuck out, and Steve found himself turning them over and over in his mind, poking at them, and wondering what he could have done differently. He didn’t even realize that he was shaking until Thor reached over and placed a large, heavy hand on his shoulder. 

“Will you tell me?” he asked, and it was simply a question, with no command. 

Steve took a deep breath. “They tortured me,” he heard himself say. “They took all these . . . samples, and they hung me up, and beat me, and cut me, and shocked me. I thought . . . I can’t remember why, but I thought that they wanted to practice incapacitating an enhanced body in case they recaptured the Winter Soldier. But now . . . I’m not so sure. The things they said to me. It was pure hatred, just for what I am. I tried not to let them get to me, to keep this little part of myself untouched, on the inside. I think I might have failed.” 

“I see no failure,” Thor said. “You are alive. Though you return to us wounded in body and in spirit, I think it was your courage and strength that brought you through your trials. You are truly a warrior, and I am proud to fight at your side.” 

Thor wasn’t very good at sarcasm, so Steve knew that he meant every word. And his earnest respect very nearly undid Steve completely. As it was, he lay back on his pillow, and took long slow breaths as a few tears ran down his face. In a tiny voice, he said, “I want Bucky. I miss him, and I want him back.” 

A look of pained grief flashed across Thor’s face, but was gone again in an instant. His hand tightened a little on Steve’s shoulder. “I know,” he said quietly. “I understand.” 

Steve considered the request that had gotten them into this situation in the first place, and he knew that Thor did, in fact, understand. So he closed his eyes and allowed himself to take strength and comfort from the large, warm hand that rested on his shoulder, anchoring him to this time and this place.


	10. Soldier's Heart

  1. **Soldier’s Heart**



  

 

Bruce released Steve from the medical bay a day later, under orders to take it easy for the next couple of days. Unusually, Steve obeyed this order, spending several hours curled up on the couch in the common room with a stack of magazines, which he flipped through listlessly. Tony had no idea how much of the content made any impression on Steve. Several of them boasted feature stories about the attack on the synagogue in Springfield, and those were the pages that were wrinkled and dog-eared when Tony found the magazines scattered over the floor after Steve fell asleep on the couch. He picked them up and set them on the coffee table, carefully hiding _Time_ and _Newsweek_ in between _Sports Illustrated_ and _Martha Stewart Living_. Then he draped a blanket over Steve and went down to his workshop to sketch out a new idea that had been churning in his brain. 

Agents K and Orange visited the Tower twice more to collect statements from Bruce, who did his best to convey the experiential, inarticulate memories of the Hulk, and from Steve, who emerged from his meeting even more downcast than he had been before. Tony was thrilled when Agent K announced that they had finished their interviews, and watched them leave on JARVIS’s video feed, just so that he could cheer when the door closed behind them. 

“Not a fan of the FBI?” Clint asked, upon seeing this. 

“They don’t get it,” Tony said. “They just – they think it’s all about going out to arrest third-rate little groups like the American Third Wave Front.” 

Clint shrugged. “I don’t remember much from high school civics,” he said. “In fact, I don’t remember whether I ever took high school civics. But I did learn somewhere that that’s what the Bureau is for. Domestic terrorists, and kidnappings, the Mafia, things like that.” 

“They’re going to track down and arrest the domestic terrorists, but not the group that armed them,” Tony said. “And someone’s going to get a little prison sentence for taking Steve, but no one’s going to touch the people who imprisoned and tortured him.” 

“HYDRA is international,” Clint pointed out. “Isn’t that more something for the World Security Council?” 

Tony sighed. He’d reviewed the transcripts of Thor’s meeting with them, and had even tried to schedule one of his own, once it became clear that the FBI was not going to look outside of its own mandate. But the WSC had turned him down, not quite saying outright that they believed that HYDRA was no longer dangerous following Steve’s defeat of Project Insight. Tony suspected that the new WSC members had been more cowed by what had happened to their predecessors than they cared to admit, but that didn’t make him like their answer any more. 

“They punted,” he said. “I think HYDRA’s our problem. No one else wants it. And, as many, many people in my life have told me, if you want something done right . . .” 

“. . . you gotta do it yourself,” Clint finished. “Well, looks like we’ve got stuff to keep us busy for a while.” 

“And that’s exactly what I’m doing,” Tony said. 

Clint peered at his assortment of drawings, equations, and notes. “I don’t get it. What exactly is that?” 

“Just a little something I’m working on. Something to make the planet a bit easier to defend. You know, in case Little Brother decides to do another comeback tour.” 

Clint laughed. “Well, next time I’m playing a trivia quiz, and the question comes up ‘How is Loki like Frank Sinatra,’ I’ll have an answer.” He clapped Tony on the shoulder. “Don’t work too hard, man. Way I figure it, we’ve earned a bit of downtime.” 

Tony flashed a quick smile. “This is my downtime, Annie Oakley.” 

“Catch you later. I’m heading for the gym.” 

Tony watched Clint leave the workshop. Then he returned his attention to the satellite network that was taking shape on his drawing board.

  

 

Steve was restless all day on Friday. Physically, he was completely recovered, and certainly well enough to spar again. He tried to burn off some of his nervous energy in a two-on-one training session in the gym against Thor and Natasha. The activity helped for a while, but Steve soon began to feel jittery, as if something were crawling up and down his spine. Thor sent a low-level blast of energy at him, and Steve leaped up in an attempt to vault over it. But a wave of nauseous apprehension crashed over him just as his feet left the floor, and he ended up under-rotating the jump. His feet slid out from beneath him, and he sat down hard. Almost immediately, Natasha dropped down from a ledge, pinned him with her knee, and touched a de-powered stun baton to his throat. 

“Your touch,” Steve gasped. 

Natasha climbed off of him, and then extended a hand to help him to his feet. “Shouldn’t have been,” she said. “What happened there?” 

“Got sloppy.” 

Natasha gave him a look of sharp disbelief. “Sloppy is you letting my baton slip past your shield so that you have to flip me. Sitting down a jump like that is something else entirely. What’s going on?” 

“Nothing.” Steve shook his head. “I’m fine. Bruce said I’m ready to resume training again. Just . . . out of practice, that’s all.” 

Natasha still didn’t look convinced. “There’s out of practice, and then there’s that. Come on, Steve. You’ve been squirrelly all day.” 

Steve bit back a reflexive “I have not,” because, no matter how he reckoned his age, he wasn’t twelve. Thor took advantage of his momentary silence to approach him. 

“The lady is observant, Captain,” Thor said. “You are not yourself. I fear that I might injure you while your mind is elsewhere.” 

“Seriously, Steve,” Natasha added. “You’ve been through a lot recently, and nobody’s going to judge you or begrudge it if you need a little bit of time to sort things out.” 

Steve shook his head. “I’m fine. Really. I’ve seen worse. I’ve been through worse. Rub a little dirt on it, right? I’m fine.” 

Thor and Natasha exchanged a significant glance. Natasha took a deep breath. “Good for you,” she said. “But it’s still dangerous working with you right now. I’m calling a halt to this. We’re done for today. We’ll pick this up again tomorrow or Sunday, when we’re all a bit fresher.” 

“Nat, come on.” Steve reached out with both hands, but Natasha shook her head. She gave the formal bow that she used to end workouts, and stepped back. Steve turned to Thor. “Are you going to – ?” 

Thor inclined his head gracefully. “Ay, Captain. I stand with Miss Romanoff in this matter. It is too soon since I have seen you ill and wounded. We have the luxury of time, and I would make use of any gift that we are given. I will spar with you, but no more today.” 

Faced with two of the people he respected most in the world presenting a united front against him, Steve almost opened his mouth to argue his point further. But before he could get the words out, Thor and Natasha moved to either side of him and gently but firmly escorted him from the gym. 

“What now?” he asked, not even bothering to hide the annoyance in his voice. 

“You’re going to hit the showers,” Natasha said. “You’re not so fresh at the moment.” 

She was using what Clint and Bruce sometimes referred to as her she-who-must-be-obeyed voice. Steve had to admit that not only was it similar to a tone Peggy had occasionally taken, but it also had a similar effect on him. He didn’t argue any more, and he let his friends escort him back to his quarters.

  

 

Because Natasha had ended the workout early, Steve found himself at loose ends after his shower. His own quarters struck him as too confining, so he headed down to the common floor. The only other person there was Bruce, who was washing vegetables. Just beyond him, on the counter, there was a bowl in which white chunks marinated in an orange sauce. 

“What’s that?” Steve asked. 

“It’s going to be a chili tofu stir-fry,” Bruce said. “Once everything’s chopped, it’ll be quick to throw together, and easy eating. I think there’ll probably be enough for you, if you want any.” 

Steve shrugged. He sat down at the bar, and dropped his head into his hands. 

Bruce ran a bunch of broccoli under the tap, and looked over at Steve. “It’s Friday,” he said. “Aren’t you usually getting ready to go off to your services about now?” 

Steve glanced away in an effort to hide the discomfort that squirmed in his stomach. Bruce smiled. He put the broccoli on a cutting board, and slid the board and a knife across the bar to Steve. “How about if you chop that into bite-size pieces?” he suggested. “If you’re feeling really useful, you can peel the stems and chop them, too.” 

Steve looked up. “You’re giving me a knife right now?” 

“Why not? You’re a grownup. If you try to use that knife on anything but the broccoli, either I’ll deal with it, or the Other Guy will. So, just chop the broccoli, and let’s try not to make Tony have to redecorate the kitchen again, hm?” 

“Okay.” Steve began to slice little branches off of the broccoli. Once he had finished the entire bunch, Bruce set a couple of bell peppers and peeled carrots in front of him. 

“There’s this prayer,” Steve said after a while. “It’s called gomeil.” 

“Yeah?” Bruce began to slice a pile of mushrooms. “I don’t actually know all that much about Judaism. I was brought up Catholic, and I studied mostly Eastern traditions.” 

“It’s . . . you’re supposed to say it during the Torah service. It’s sort of a thank-you to God. If you’ve survived a life-threatening experience.” 

“Ah.” Bruce did not raise his eyes from his work. “I see.” 

“They still do it,” Steve went on. “I thought that might be one of the things that people don’t do anymore these days. I’ve never seen anyone do it. But it’s still in the prayer book. I checked.” 

Bruce ran his knife under the tap. “What do you think, baby corn or bamboo shoots and water chestnuts?” 

“The bamboo shoots and water chestnuts. I like the way they crunch.” 

“Sounds good.” Bruce opened the cupboard and rooted around among the cans. “I think it’s a lovely idea, to give thanks for something like that. You seem a bit dubious.” 

Steve stared at the pile of vegetables in front of him. “I should say it,” he murmured. “I’m all healed now. You said so.” 

“I did.” 

“I don’t want to,” Steve choked out. “I want to go to shul tonight. More than anything. But if I go, I have to bench gomeil. I can’t do that. Just thinking about it ties my stomach up in knots. But I really want to go. I really – I should be there, and I want to hear Cantor Debbie sing. But I can’t bench gomeil, and I need to do that.”

“I see the problem.” Bruce scooped Steve’s vegetables into a large metal bowl. He set the bowl on the counter, and looked around the kitchen. “You’re a little taller than I am. Can you get the wok down from that shelf? Careful, it’s in two parts.” 

Steve followed where Bruce indicated, and reached up to lift down the wok and its ring. Bruce set them on the stove and poured a bit of oil into the wok. “There. All we need to do now is turn on the heat, and everything’s chopped and ready to go. Can you tell me a bit more about this prayer? Gomeil, you said?” 

“Yeah. Gomeil.” Steve sighed. “I don’t remember the exact text. It’s just a short one, and you can read it. It’s pretty much thanking God for taking care of you, even though you haven’t really done anything to earn it.” 

Bruce nodded thoughtfully. “And you say it if you’ve survived a life-threatening experience?” 

“Yeah. I think that being in that HYDRA facility probably counts as a life-threatening experience.” 

“Absolutely,” Bruce said. “No doubt about that.” 

Steve got up, and shuffled nervously around the kitchen for a bit before realizing that he had nowhere to go. He retreated to the doorway. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” he said. “I’m all healed. I should be thrilled to go and do this.” 

Bruce moved to stand near Steve, but didn’t touch him. “I don’t think anything’s wrong with you,” he said. “I think what you’re feeling is – well, maybe not normal, but certainly understandable, and expected.” 

“How do you figure that?” 

“Well, you just said that this gomeil prayer is for someone who’s survived a life-threatening experience, but maybe you haven’t done that yet.” 

Steve shook his head. “I’m fine. You said so.” 

“You’re fine physically. But I don’t think you’re quite there mentally yet. You’ve been concentrating really hard on your physical recovery, and that’s great. But you’re still all over the place emotionally. That’s not a bad thing,” Bruce added, just as Steve began to open his mouth. “People’s bodies heal fast – yours heals faster than most – but minds and hearts, not so fast. You’re up and about, but you’re not quite through what happened to you, not yet.” 

Steve wrapped his arms around his body and ignored the stinging in his nose. “So I shouldn’t go to shul for a while, you think?” 

Bruce shook his head. “I think you should go. You just told me that you want to. And you love it. I can tell. You always seem happier and more at peace with yourself after you’ve gone. And you have some good friends there. I think you should go. Don’t say that prayer until you’re really ready to. I think you’ll know when you are. But go to the service. It’ll help you.” 

“Okay.” In an instant, Steve’s world began to look a little bit brighter, and he even managed a little smile. Bruce smiled back. 

“See?” he said. “You look happier already.” He glanced at one of the many clocks that seemed to decorate every appliance in the kitchen. “Hey, that took longer than I expected. Want a ride over there? Might be a bit faster than waiting for the train.” 

“Sure,” Steve said, mildly annoyed that he had allowed his dithering to chew up so much time, but also relieved that he still had the chance to go to the service. “Thanks,” he said softly. “For everything.” 

Bruce nodded. “You’re welcome. Go put your shoes on, and meet me downstairs in the parking garage. I’m just going to check with Tony to see if I can borrow the Audi.”

 

 

On Tuesday, Pepper called Steve and asked him to meet her for lunch at a small but elegant café near the Manhattan branch of Stark Industries. Steve had seen that café once, when Tony had first set up the branch building and had given all the Avengers a private tour. It looked like the sort of place where serious men in gray suits might decide the course of world affairs. “Should I wear a jacket and tie?” he asked. 

Pepper laughed. “Oh, no! It’s not that fancy, especially not at lunchtime. Just a clean button-down shirt, and no blue jeans. You might want to bring a sweater, too. The air conditioning can get a bit over-enthusiastic.” 

“Thanks. How about I meet you there at twelve-thirty?” 

“One o’clock. It’ll be a bit quieter then.” 

That suited Steve well, as it gave him time to take a quick shower before changing. One of the many things that he appreciated about Pepper was that she never laughed at him for not knowing what to wear, especially in this century, when half of the rules that he had been too poor to follow as a child had changed. 

At the café, after the waiter had brought Pepper’s Dover sole and Steve’s steak frites, Pepper pulled a brochure from her purse and handed it to Steve. “Are you familiar with Stark Speaks?” she asked. 

Steve shook his head and glanced at the brochure. It advertised speakers who went to schools and all sorts of religious and community centers. Some of the topics looked tremendously interesting, and Steve wondered if he should give the brochure to Rabbi Bloch, who was always looking for ideas for new events that the synagogue could host. 

“It’s an initiative that I’ve set up,” Pepper said. “We match speakers with local places who might be interested in what they have to say, and we subsidize the fee. We do a lot of schools, church halls. I’m even working with the Department of Corrections to see if we can get something going in the prison system.” 

“That’s a good idea,” Steve said. 

“You can see a few of the talks on YouTube, if you want, just to see what they’re like.” Pepper took a bite of her fish. “I’d like to invite you to do one.” 

Steve had to set down his knife and fork so that he wouldn’t embarrass himself by dropping them on the floor. “What could I talk about?” he asked. “I don’t really think I know all that much. Certainly not about philosophy or art or great ideas, like these people. I didn’t even really go to college, just a year of art school.” 

“That’s okay,” Pepper said with a little laugh. “You know a lot more than you think. And don’t worry. This audience would just be interested in hearing about you, about your experiences growing up, your time in the Army, and some of your thoughts about the modern world, from your perspective. It’ll probably end up being more of a conversation than a speech anyway.” 

Steve nodded. “I guess I could do that.” At least it was something that Steve knew a little bit about, even if talking about his own life to strange audiences occasionally felt like shouting into the wind. “Where do you want me to go?” 

Pepper handed him another brochure. “The Riverdale Senior Center. It’s a combined assisted-living facility and nursing home, run by the Nadelman Foundation. Most of the residents are Jewish, but not all of them. They were looking for a speaker for an event in about ten days. What do you think?” 

Steve looked through the second brochure. There were photographs of old men and women, some of them in wheelchairs, playing cards and mah jongg, lifting small weights, taking a painting class, and visiting a park. There were other pictures of the same old men and women laughing at a lively Purim party, with small children in costumes running around and a group of teenagers dancing. It looked like a friendly sort of place.

As he looked at the brochure, Steve realized, with only a dull shock, that most of the residents were probably his own age, or even a little younger. He wondered if Becca and Ida Barnes had lived in a place like this towards the ends of their lives. And then something else struck him. He remembered the few minutes he had spent watching Sam Wilson lead a group meeting at the VA in Washington, and how the experiences he had heard about had resonated with him, even if the warfare they described seemed different. But the residents of this old-age home had lived through the same war that he had – many of them might even have fought in it – and they would understand things that even Sam’s group might not quite be able to grasp. 

A shiver went down Steve’s spine as he looked at a photograph of one old man in an armchair, wearing a paper crown and chatting with a little girl in a fairy princess outfit. He wanted more than anything to be able to sit down and talk with that man, who knew how to survive, and how to move past pain, hardship, loss, and terror. If that old man could find his way over the bridge, then Steve wanted to learn from him. When he looked up, he saw that Pepper’s eyes were shining. 

“You did this on purpose, didn’t you?” he asked, feeling a smile tug at the corners of his mouth. 

Pepper shrugged, but the twinkle in her eyes didn’t go away. “They wanted a speaker,” she said. “I thought . . . why not offer someone special? I think they’ll really like you. What do you say?” 

“I’ll do it. I’ll go speak to them.” As soon as Steve had said it, the world seemed to get brighter, and his food smelled more appetizing. Then he knew that he had made the right choice. 

Pepper smiled broadly. “Good. I’ll call them after lunch and let them know.” 

“Tell them . . . tell them I’m looking forward to meeting them,” Steve said. “And, Pepper . . . thank you.” 

He couldn’t quite find the words to tell her everything that he wanted to thank her for, and he wasn’t sure that he would have been able to speak those words anyway, even if he had found them. But Pepper nodded, and clasped his hand. Her grip was warm and firm, and Steve thought that she understood, even without words. He smiled at her, and realized that it was his first real smile since Thor had brought the news of Loki’s escape. Pepper held his hand for a minute, giving him just a little bit of strength and encouragement for the future.

  

 

END

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to everyone who has read and enjoyed this story! Thanks also for sticking through something that’s rather darker and more violent than my usual material.
> 
> Although technically the Torah service is part of Shabbat (Saturday) morning worship, it is a peculiarity of American Judaism (at least, Reform and Conservative) that the Friday night service is more enthusiastically attended. I’ve been to several synagogues where a Torah service is inserted into the Friday night services, because that’s when people will be there for it. _Birkat HaGomeil_ , the Thanksgiving Blessing, does appear in _Mishkan T’filah_ , the current prayerbook used by the American Reform movement. However, like Steve, I’ve never seen anyone recite it.


End file.
